lace curtainn.adj.
/leɪs ˈkəːtn/, U.S. /ˌleɪs ˈkərtn/ A. n.
1. A curtain made of lace, hung at a window, glass door, etc., which lets in light but makes seeing into the room difficult. Usually in plural. Cf. net curtain n. at net n.1 Compounds 3.
ΘΚΠ
society > inhabiting and dwelling > inhabited place > a building > furniture and fittings > covers or hangings > [noun] > hangings > curtain > net or lace curtain
lace curtain1824
net curtain1851
scrim1880
window scrim1913
1824 Brit. Press 6 Aug. 1/4 Lace curtains for four windows.
1895 Montgomery Ward Catal. Spring & Summer 347/3 Lace curtains and lambrequins.
1896 Chums 8 July 722/2 Lace curtains to the large open scuttles.
1926 E. Bowen Ann Lee's 257 The room received less and less light from the windows,..partly because of the thick lace curtains.
1975 H. Duncan Treehouse (1982) 191 He went over to the two west windows, lifted a lace curtain and let his eyes roam out into the night.
2013 N.Y. Mag. 17 June 34/3 Ferals are the homeless of the feline population, the down-and-out counterparts to the purebreds peering out from behind lace curtains.
2. figurative and in allusive use. In plural. A lifestyle or outlook associated with having lace curtains in one's windows; esp. (as a symbol of) middle-class status or gentility.Frequently with reference to Irish immigrants in the United States; see sense B.
ΘΚΠ
society > society and the community > social class > the common people > specific classes of common people > [noun] > middle class or bourgeoisie > symbol of
lace curtain1957
1957 New. Eng. Q. 30 439 The Irish are becoming middle class, lace-curtain if not two-toilet, and lace curtains and Republican inclinations go together.
1972 N.Y. Mag. 3 Jan. 47/1 We are left with the dismaying truths of Joe without his lace curtains and pretensions to an ethic.
1983 H. R. Diner Erin's Daughters in Amer. p. xiii Irish people made their way from a ‘pick and shovel’ shanty life to the ‘lace curtains’ of the middle class.
1999 Rev. Eng. Stud. 50 412 The succession of working-class youths..who stare, with artful pudor, from behind the lace curtains of Auden's early poetry.
2014 M. C. Kelly Ireland's Great Famine in Irish-Amer. Hist. ii. 71 As the strident rhetoric subsided, mid-1800s events held diminishing potential to destroy the fragile lace curtains of the 1900s.
B. adj.
Middle-class; genteel, respectable; (depreciative) having pretensions to middle-class status or gentility. Also: of or characteristic of people of such a class or outlook. Cf. sense A. 2.Frequently with reference to the use of lace curtains as a marker of social status by Irish immigrants in the United States, esp. in lace-curtain Irish (cf. shanty Irish adj. at shanty n.1 Compounds 2).
ΘΚΠ
society > society and the community > social class > the common people > specific classes of common people > [adjective] > middle-class or bourgeois
moyen1481
middling1631
bourgeois1761
small bourgeois1832
lower middle class1835
middle class1836
bourgeoisistic1848
petty bourgeois1864
upper middle class1872
petit bourgeois1887
lace curtain1928
haut bourgeois1940
bourgie1968
1928 N. Y. Times 2 Dec. ii. 24/7 His ‘enemies’ he took in order [in his speech], from Judge Jones of the District Court,..to..the ‘high hats of High Street’ and the ‘lace-curtain Irish’.
1934 J. T. Farrell Young Manhood Studs Lonigan xviii. 282 They were all trying to put on the dog, show that they were lace-curtain Irish, and lived in steam-heat.
1949 Sat. Rev. Lit. (U.S.) 25 June 33/1 Mrs. Ruskay's folks were lace-curtain Jews; they had a piano and a Polish maid.
1957 New. Eng. Q. 30 439 The Irish are becoming middle class, lace-curtain if not two-toilet, and lace curtains and Republican inclinations go together.
1970 Guardian 5 June 10/2 Britain has a long tradition of what might be called lace-curtain racialism.
2005 D. McWilliams Pope's Children iii. 28 The only thing lace curtain Ireland feared more than the Church, was the working class.
Derivatives
ˈlace-curtained adj.
ΘΚΠ
society > inhabiting and dwelling > inhabited place > a building > furniture and fittings > covers or hangings > [adjective] > having hangings > having curtains > of specific type
lace-curtained1853
portièred1897
blackout1934
swagged1959
net-curtained1972
1853 Gleason's Pict. Drawing-room Compan. 18 July 394/2 There was a lace-curtained glass door leading into the ample store-room.
1968 Time 2 Aug. 49/3 Friel's language has a Gaelic thrust and lilt, but his lace-curtained Irish dramas could easily have been written three decades ago.
2007 J. McCourt Now Voyagers ix. 413 A late afternoon egg-yolk sun..splashed..in through fan-light, demi-lunes, and long lace-curtained Georgian windows.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, March 2017; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.adj.1824