stockinet
(stɒkɪˈnɛt)
Also stockinett(e, stockinnet, stockingett(e, -nette.
[Prob. a perversion (as if f. stocking n. + -et1, -ette) of the older stocking-net: see stocking n. 6 b.]
1. A knitted textile fabric of considerable elasticity used chiefly in the making of undergarments. Also stockinet cloth, stockinet material.
| 1824– [see 3]. 1862 Catal. Internat. Exhib., Brit. II. No. 4176, Woollen Manufacturers... [Exhibiting] Elastic stockingetts. 1880 Cassell's Fam. Mag. VI. 442 The stockingette material, or elastic cloth,..is being adapted to whole dresses, tunics [etc.]. 1881 Ibid. VII. 122 Stockingnette has proved this winter a bad investment. 1890 Textile News 20 June, Stockinettes and fancy woollens. 1905 Daily News 28 Mar. 12 An important clue was found in the discovery of three masks of black stockingette. |
2. A garment made of stockinet. (Short for stockinet pantaloons, shirt.)
| 1837 T. Hook in New Monthly Mag. L. 155 The dancing-master in his stockinets and pumps. 1838 Poe Narr. A. G. Pym vii. Wks. 1895 V. 91 The shirt..was a blue stockinet, with large white stripes running across. |
b. ? = stocking 1 b. (nonce-use.)
| 1864 Ticknor Life Prescott 201 A full-length of Cortés,..his nether extremities in a sort of stockinet, like the old cavaliers of the sixteenth century. |
3. attrib. (or adj.) Made of stockinet.
| 1824 W. Irving T. Trav. II. 28 He wore a pair of dingy-white stockinet pantaloons. 1884 Girl's Own Paper 29 Nov. 138/3 The lady working..wears a stockingette jacket. |