stencil
- 01 B2 Upper Intermediate
a piece of plastic, metal, or paper with a shape cut out of it. You put it on a surface and paint over it to leave the shape behind.
a thin sheet of material, such as plastic or metal, with a perforated pattern or design through which ink or paint is applied to a surface.
Simple“The artist used a star-shaped stencil to decorate the child's bedroom wall.”
In context“The industrial designer created a custom brass stencil to ensure the company logo was applied uniformly across every wooden crate.”
- 02 B2 Upper Intermediate
the picture or pattern that you make when you use a stencil.
the specific design or lettering produced on a surface by the application of pigment through a stencil.
Simple“The red stencils on the pavement showed the way to the museum.”
In context“Faded stencils of old shipping instructions were still visible on the side of the abandoned warehouse.”
“I would have liked to press my own palm against a stencil and shake hands across more than 30,000 years, but of course this was forbidden.”
Likely a nominalization of Middle English stencellen (“to garnish with bright hues”), borrowed from Middle French estinceller (“to glisten”), from Old French estenceler (“to spark”), from Old French estencele (“spark”), from Vulgar Latin *stincilla, from metathesis of Latin scintilla (“spark”). The verb is from the noun.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.