barbershop
Americannoun
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especially British, barber's shop. the place of business of a barber.
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the singing of four-part harmony in barbershop style or the music sung in this style.
adjective
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specializing in the unaccompanied part-singing of popular songs in which four voices move in close, highly chromatic harmony.
a barbershop quartet.
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characteristic of such part-singing.
noun
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the premises of a barber
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(modifier) denoting or characterized by a type of close four-part harmony for male voices, popular in romantic and sentimental songs of the 1920s and 1930s
a barbershop quartet
Etymology
Origin of barbershop
Explanation
A barbershop is one of the places where people go to get their hair cut. You might visit a barbershop at the beginning of every summer to get a short crew cut. While some hair cutters call themselves stylists and the places where they work salons, others are barbers who trim hair and shave necks in barbershops. The most common customer at a barbershop is a man who wants a quick haircut and possibly a beard trim or shave as well. In the 1500's, a barbershop was called a "barbery," from the Latin barba, or "beard." A "barbershop quartet" is a four-person, harmonizing singing group.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
By the late 1970s, Angel had moved his barbershop and pool hall to follow a realignment of Route 66, because he knew that traffic was vital.
From Los Angeles Times • May 12, 2026
BIRMINGHAM, England—The neighborhood around Harris Hussein’s barbershop in this once thriving industrial city is marked by potholes and strewn with piles of uncollected trash.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 7, 2026
Saman says working illegally in a car wash, barbershop or mini-mart would have been very easy to do, but he told us he would never have done that.
From BBC • Nov. 7, 2025
Baller amenities are said to include a bowling alley, recording studio, and barbershop.
From MarketWatch • Oct. 29, 2025
“He worked in the mines and sang baritone in a barbershop quartet. After he died, my mother changed our last name. She thought it would make things easier on us.”
From "Moon Over Manifest" by Clare Vanderpool
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
