Idiom
save someone's face
Meaning
to preserve someone's pride, especially as defined by customary social settings.
Meaning adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Examples
“He lied to save his friend's face.”
“She blamed the technical error on the software to save her colleague's face during the meeting.”
“By framing the public correction as a minor oversight, the manager managed to save his employee's face without damaging her professional reputation.”
Examples
simple
“He lied to save his friend's face.”
contextual
“She blamed the technical error on the software to save her colleague's face during the meeting.”
complex
“By framing the public correction as a minor oversight, the manager managed to save his employee's face without damaging her professional reputation.”
Key words
Related idioms
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