Meaning & use
esthetic
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Meanings
adjectivenot comparable
Relating to beauty or to judging beauty, especially in art, design, or appearance.
Grammar: Usually classifies a noun rather than degree: an esthetic choice; “very esthetic” sounds uncommon.
Patterns
- esthetic judgment
- esthetic appeal
- esthetic standards
- an esthetic choice
The architect gave an esthetic reason for leaving the brick uncovered.
Her esthetic taste favors clean lines and quiet colors.
The app settings include purely esthetic options, such as theme and font.
nouncountable
A particular set of ideas about beauty that shapes a style of art, design, writing, or life.
Grammar: Names one system of taste: a minimalist esthetic; the plural esthetics is less common.
Patterns
- an esthetic of something
- the esthetic behind something
- develop an esthetic
The café has a warm, handmade esthetic that customers notice immediately.
His photographs share a spare esthetic with mid-century design.
The director explained the esthetic behind using only natural light.
Word forms
| plural | esthetics |
|---|
Common combinations
- esthetic judgment
- Trust your esthetic judgment when the rules feel too rigid.
- esthetic appeal
- The old bridge has esthetic appeal even before you learn its history.
- esthetic standards
- Museums apply different esthetic standards to folk art and court art.
- an esthetic choice
- Painting the door red was an esthetic choice, not a practical one.
- the esthetic behind
- Can you explain the esthetic behind pairing rough wood with glass?
Synonyms and how they differ
- artistic
- Broader: it can mean skilled in art, while esthetic specifically concerns beauty or taste.
- tasteful
- Praises good judgment in appearance; esthetic can be neutral and describe principles, not approval.
- visual
- Concerns sight only, whereas esthetic includes evaluation of beauty, not merely what is seen.
- beautiful
- Describes a pleasing quality; esthetic often describes standards or awareness used to judge such qualities.
Opposites
Word family
- aesthetics noun
- The study or set of principles of beauty and taste; also spelled esthetics in American English.
- esthetically adverb
- In a way that concerns beauty or artistic effect.
- estheticism noun
- The attitude or doctrine that gives great importance to beauty; often capitalized in art history.
- esthetician noun
- A person trained in beauty treatments, also spelled aesthetician; a distinct later use.
Commonly confused: esthetic or aesthetic? esthetic or anesthetic?
esthetic vs aesthetic
Same meaning; aesthetic is the spelling preferred in British English, while esthetic is common American spelling.
esthetic vs anesthetic
An anesthetic causes loss of feeling; it differs by the first letter and belongs to medicine, not beauty.
Practice
In an American article about design, which spelling fits the blank: “The ___ of the poster is deliberately minimal”?
Choose one answer.
Choose esthetic for American English in this meaning of beauty and design. Aesthetic is the usual British spelling, anesthetic means loss of feeling, and ascetic means self-denying.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “esthetic”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.