wallflower

UK/ˈwɔːlˌflaʊ.ə/US/ˈwɔlˌflaʊ.ɚ/

wallflower noun: any of several short-lived herbs or shrubs of the Erysimum genus with bright yellow to red flowers.

Image: Hans B, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

wallflower (plural wallflowers)

Any of several short-lived herbs or shrubs of the Erysimum genus with bright yellow to red flowers.
- A polypetalous corolla is either cruciform, as in a wall-flower, rosaceous, papilionaceous, as in the pea kind, or incomplete, when some parts found in analogous flowers are wanting.1809, William Nicholson, “BOTANY”, in The British Encyclopedia, or Dictionary of Arts and Sciences; […], volume I (A … B), London: Printed by C[harles] Whittingham, […]; for Longman, Hurst, Rees, and...
Gastrolobium grandiflorum, a poisonous bushy shrub, endemic to Australia.
A person who does not dance at a party, due to shyness or unpopularity; by extension, anyone who is left on the sidelines while an activity takes place.
- Mrs. Galbraith shook all over with laughter as she replied, "Hear that boy, asking me to dance ! I'm content to be a wallflower, now-a-days."1878, Fannie Bean, Dr. Mortimer's Patient: A Novel, page 23
- And now, by virtue of his office, he is entitled to a seat in the Grand Lodge. Is it any wonder he is a wall-flower there […]1885, The Freemason's Repository, page 133
(informal) Any person who is socially awkward, shy, or reserved.
- I've always been a wallflower, even in my own home. But, I'm willing to learn to be a part of your world. I would like to. I have already told my parents that I want to go to soirées.2019, Liz Tyner, To Win a Wallflower, Harlequin, →ISBN

wallflower (third-person singular simple present wallflowers, present participle wallflowering, simple past and past participle wallflowered)

(intransitive) To stand shyly apart from a dance, waiting to be asked to join in.
- […] the idea that a full tango experience is impossible without the presence of wallflowers and without the threat of wallflowering as the potential dancers enter the tango club.2010, Alexandra Carter, Janet O'Shea, The Routledge Dance Studies Reader, page 237

خاموش طبیعت, شرمیلا

herb of the Erysimum genus: خَيْرِيّ ḵayriyy, قَصِيصَة qaṣīṣa, مَنْثُور manṯūr, تُودَرِيّ tūdariyy, فُجْل الْجَمَلِ fujl al-jamali

It is a triumph, of course, to have plenty of partners, and not to be a wallflower for a single dance.1897, Mrs. C. E. Humphry, Manners for Women, page 53:
Jack Breen was a wallflower; still at the same time I noticed he was cultivating an ornamental smile — a Jack of Trumps, you bet.1913, Plasterer, page 8:
She was a wallflower in a sleepy little town itself a wallflower.1921, Collier's, page 3:
You two aren't already going all wallflower, are you?" "We are not wallflowers." "To be fair, I can be.2013 May 22, Dan Shive, El Goonish Shive (webcomic), Comic for Wednesday, May 22, 2013:

Noun
plural	wallflowers
alternative form	wall-flower
alternative form	wall flower
Verb
third-person singular present	wallflowers
present participle	wallflowering
past participle	wallflowered
past	wallflowered

From wall + flower.

What does wallflower mean?: Wallflower means any of several short-lived herbs or shrubs of the Erysimum genus with bright yellow to red flowers.
What is wallflower in Urdu?: Wallflower in Urdu is خاموش طبیعت, شرمیلا. See Wallflower meaning in Urdu.
How do you use wallflower in a sentence?: It is a triumph, of course, to have plenty of partners, and not to be a wallflower for a single dance.
What part of speech is wallflower?: Wallflower can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce wallflower?: Wallflower is pronounced /ˈwɔːlˌflaʊ.ə/ (UK).
What is the plural of wallflower?: The plural of wallflower is wallflowers.

Adapted from Wiktionary: wallflower (page history and authors); wallflower (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-wallflower.ogg.

Cite this entry: “wallflower.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/wallflower. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.