velvet glove
Americannoun
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.
It described her as having an "iron fist under the velvet glove", and observed that she knew how to "cut down Himalayan egos to the height of foothills".
From BBC ● Aug. 31, 2026
“We’ve got to a point where we can no longer be able to afford the velvet glove diplomacy.”
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 16, 2023
Still, within the velvet glove remains an iron fist.
From New York Times ● Jan. 13, 2022
A Republican colleague, Rep. E. Clay Shaw Jr., once told the Herald that Ms. Meek had “a velvet glove, but sometimes she can have a fist in it. She’s so likable that it’s sometimes disarming.”
From Washington Post ● Nov. 29, 2021
If we must handle the Southern mutineers in their Rebelutionary war with a velvet glove, let there be an iron hand inside, worked by the high-pressure power of public indignation at their treachery and faithlessness.
From The Continental Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 1, January 1862 Devoted to Literature and National Policy by Various
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.
