Meaning of faux in English

faux

adjective

/fəʊ/ us

/foʊ/

Add to word list Add to word list

(of a material, an object, etc.) not real, but made to look or seem real:

faux fur

a faux-brick wall

I finished the outfit with a string of faux pearls.

Synonyms

fake 
false
imitation 

disapproving

(of an emotion, etc.) not sincerely felt but intended to give a particular effect:

There was a lot of faux outrage and hypocritical whining in the press over the move.

The script is so full of faux emotion you start to long for a bit of cynicism.

Synonyms

fake 
false
sham

More examplesFewer examples

The marble inlay is faux.
He wore a gladiator costume complete with a faux sword.
Since I became a vegetarian 10 years ago I've eaten some terrible faux meat.
The car's flamboyant interior features faux crocodile leather.
Please, spare me your faux concern.
There was a lot of faux sorrow in the media when he passed away.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Copying and copies

See more results »

You can also find related words, phrases, and synonyms in the topics:

Affected & insincere

(Definition of faux from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

Examples of faux

faux

Wandering in a faux pastoral, the nomadic dervish has no town, no ethnicity, and no specific territory.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Nevertheless, it is instructive to trace his faux pas.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

And the two possibilities are (a) the body (yielding real proprioception and kinesthesis), and (b) a body emulator (yielding faux proprioception and kinesthesis).

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The emerging lavatories were ornate and luxurious, including faux-marble crown molding and white enamel urinals.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Next are the 'faux savants', all wearing gold spectacles; claiming science to be infallible, they chant contemporary scientific words with obvious anachronism.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

It is that the counterfeiter, if not the passer, can be thought of as an officer faux.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

This formulation is preferred by politicians and professional athletes who have made some egregious faux pas or been caught in especially sordid straits.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

By contrast, motor imagery is a sequence of faux proprioception and kinesthesis.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

This finding suggests difficulty in truly empathizing with the characters in the stories or an indifference to the impact of the faux pas on the speaker or the listener.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

They were then asked a series of questions that address detection and understanding of the faux pas, the mental state of the listener and the mental state of the speaker.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Indeed, his deft addition of "and so on" at the end of the transcription reiterates his faux-indifference to the devolution of language from superficial civility to rash irrationality.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

However, this faux pas was carried by a majority.

From Europarl Parallel Corpus - English

In my view, item 4 has been included because of a faux pas by a number of colleagues.

From Europarl Parallel Corpus - English

It really was an awful faux pas, was it not, seriously to suggest that the facts are not available?

From the

Hansard archive

Example from the Hansard archive. Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0

Instead of that, he made what we felt was a most unfortunate faux pus recently.

From the

Hansard archive

Example from the Hansard archive. Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0

See all examples of faux

These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

What is the pronunciation of faux, Faux?