louche

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   disreputable or morally questionable, often in a stylish or appealing way

   The novel follows a louche group of artists and gamblers.

2. 2
   adj

   showing questionable taste or a decadent lack of respectability

   They spent the evening in a louche basement club.

Borrowed from French louche, literally ‘squinting’ or ‘cross-eyed’ and figuratively ‘ambiguous, suspicious.’ French derived it from Latin luscus, ‘one-eyed.’ English developed the modern sense of stylishly disreputable.

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