# frou-frou
## English
### Alternative forms

* froufrou, froo-froo, fru-fru, froofroo, frufru

### Etymology

Borrowed from French frou-frou, an onomatopoeia.

### Pronunciation

* (UK, US) IPA: /ˈfɹuːfɹuː/
* Hyphenation: frou‧frou
* Audio (Southern England):(file)

### Noun

frou-frou (plural frou-frous)
* (onomatopoeia) A rustling sound, particularly the rustling of a large silk dress.
** 1870 June 4, Athenaeum, page 734:The modern frou-frou of satin and gros-de-Naples skirts is nothing to the rustling of brocaded silks.
** 1876, William Besant et al., The Golden Butterfly, act I, scene vi, line 108:[…] the frou-frou of life was lost to her […]
** 1901, Jack London, “The Great Interrogation”, in The God of His Fathers‎, New York: McClure, Phillips & Co., page 34:She was pretty, charming, and, moreover, a widow. And because of this she at once had at heel any number of Eldorado Kings, officials, and adventuring younger sons, whose ears were yearning for the frou-frou of a woman’s skirts.
** 1904 December, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “The Adventure of the Second Stain”, in The Return of Sherlock Holmes, New York, N.Y.: McClure, Phillips & Co., published February 1905, →OCLC:“Now, Watson, the fair sex is your department,” said Holmes, with a smile, when the dwindling frou-frou of skirts had ended in the slam of the front door.
** 1905 January 12, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], The Scarlet Pimpernel, popular edition, London: Greening & Co., published 20 March 1912, →OCLC, page 94:Lord Grenville took a hasty farewell of the ladies and slipped back into his box, where M. Chauvelin had sat all through this entr’acte, with his eternal snuff-box in his hand, and with his keen pale eyes intently fixed upon a box opposite to him, where, with much frou-frou of silken skirts, much laughter and general stir of curiosity amongst the audience, […]
** 2014 September 6, Tony Roberts, “Poem to a Friend Feeling Out of His Element”, in The Guardian‎, →ISSN:Impervious to the cheap perfumes and the frou-frou of young ladies' skirts, he finally and with deepest dread plunged ahead, banging in his ignorance on the keys as if they were a snare drum.

### Adjective

frou-frou (comparative more frou-frou, superlative most frou-frou)
* Liable to create the sound of rustling cloth, similar to 19th-century dresses.
* Highly ornamented, overly elaborate; excessively girly.
    They ate in a frou-frou restaurant at the top of a skyscraper.
** 2009 September 1, Michael Chapman; Matthew Chapman, “Strong Bad Email #204: dictionary”, in Homestar Runner‎, spoken by Strong Bad (Matthew Chapman):Kinda like a frou-frou dessert at a chichi restaurant, restaurant.
** 2012 June 30, Miranda Sawyer, “Rewind radio: Love Love Love Like the Beatles; Is It Worth It?; 6-Love-6”, in The Observer‎, →ISSN:This is a column for a Sunday paper, designed to be absorbed at leisure, over coffee and frou-frou pastries, at around noon.
** 2023 January 21, Andrew Lawrence, “Netflix’s Reed Hastings changed the way we watch TV – for better or for worse”, in The Guardian‎, →ISSN:For the price of a frou-frou Starbucks drink, a Netflix subscriber could binge this content ad nauseam without suffering through a single commercial – the ideal home viewing experience.
* (derogatory) Unimportant, silly, useless.
    Bob was off faffing about doing frou-frou nonsense whilst Edwina kept her nose to the grindstone.
** 2008 July 15, Matthew Yglesias, “Obama's Elitism Problem, Continued”, in The Atlantic‎:Barack Obama, out of touch with the working man as usual, has an aggressive program for carbon emissions reductions and has spoken of the need for such frou-frou measures as increased investment in transit infrastructure, intercity rail, and even bicycling.
** 2024 September 28, HarryBlank, “Not Ready for Prime Time”, in SCP Foundation‎, archived from the original on 29 September 2024:Dr. Okorie: Those paintings on the walls have a definite effect on people. A very specific definite effect, with wildly variable results. Would you call them de-inhibitors, Lillian? Dr. Lillihammer: I'd call them cognition divergence vectors. I've already got the paper half-written in my mind. Dr. Blank: Explain it to us froufrou hard and social scientists.

### Verb

frou-frou (third-person singular simple present frou-frous, present participle frou-frouing, simple past and past participle frou-froued)
* (uncommon, intransitive) To move with the sound of rustling dresses.
** 1894 October, The Vassar Miscellany, volume 26, page 81:“Oh, you funny girl! You look so surprised. Confess, now, there's nothing you can hide from me,” and ruffling my hair as she passed she frou-froued out of the room.
** 1905 May 18, Truth, page 1289:[…] frou-frouing femininities […]

#### Usage notes

Almost exclusively seen in the form frou-frouing.

### References

* “frou-frou, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 2021.
* “frou-frou, v.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 2021.

## French
### Etymology

Imitative.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /fʁu.fʁu/

### Noun

frou-frou m (plural frous-frous)
* a frou-frou; a rustling sound, as of silk fabric

#### Derived terms

* froufrouter

#### Descendants

* → English: frou-frou
* → Portuguese: frufru
* → Spanish: frufrú

### Further reading

* “frou-frou”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.