Etymology: Henry Colley March, a British physician and amateur archaeologist, devised the word in 1889 by combining the Greek skeuos, which means container or implement, with morphē, a reference to shape. Meaning: In an age deeply preoccupied with ornament, March offered a handy term for a common but often awkwardly described kind of decoration. “The forms demonstrably due to structure require a name, ” he wrote. “If those taken from animals are called zoomorphs and those taken from plants phyllomorphs, it will be convenient to call those derived from structure skeuomorphs.” The lion foot at the base of a chair leg is a zoomorph, and a foliated wrought iron gate This story is from Kinfolk Issue Thirty-Three Buy Now Related Stories Arts & Culture Issue 44 Word: Anecdata Fact, meet fiction. Arts & Culture Issue 43 Word: Knolling The fascinating history of the flat lay. Arts & Culture Issue 42 Word: Hyperobject A word for things too huge to name. Arts & Culture Word: Negentropy A physicist’s fix for a messy home. Arts & Culture Issue 40 My Word In praise of cursing. Arts & Culture Issue 39 Word: Umarell The men who stare at construction sites.
