Biedermeier
[bee-der-mahy-er]
- noting or pertaining to a style of furnishings common in German-speaking areas in the early to middle 19th century, generally existing as a simplification of the French Directoire and Empire styles, usually executed in fruitwood with much use of matched veneers, and often displaying architectural motifs.
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Origin of Biedermeier
named after Gottlieb Biedermeier, imaginary author of poems actually composed by various writers and published in German magazine Fliegende Blätter from 1855 on
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Biedermeier
- of or relating to a decorative and furnishing style in mid-19th-century Germany, characterized by solidity and conventionality
- boringly conventional in outlook; bourgeois
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Word Origin
C19: after Gottlieb Biedermeier, a fictitious character portrayed as a conventional unimaginative bourgeois and the author of poems actually written by several satirical poets
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
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Word Origin and History for biedermeier
Biedermeier
1854, from German, from Gottlieb Biedermeier, name of a fictitious writer of stodgy poems (invented by Ludwig Eichrodt as a satire on bourgeois taste); the name generally applied to styles prevalent in Germany 1815-48; also "conventional, bourgeois."
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper