wainscot
Americannoun
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wood, especially oak and usually in the form of paneling, for lining interior walls.
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the lining itself, especially as covering the lower portion of a wall.
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a dado, especially of wood, lining an interior wall.
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British. oak of superior quality and cut, imported from the Baltic countries for fine woodwork.
verb (used with object)
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wainscots,
present (3rd person singular)
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wainscoted,
past participle, past
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wainscotted,
past participle, past (especially British)
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wainscoting,
present participle
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wainscotting
present participle (especially British)
noun
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Also called: wainscoting. wainscotting. a lining applied to the walls of a room, esp one of wood panelling
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the lower part of the walls of a room, esp when finished in a material different from the upper part
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fine quality oak used as wainscot
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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wainscotsimple
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wainscotssimple
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have wainscotedperfect
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have wainscottedperfect
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has wainscotedperfect
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has wainscottedperfect
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am wainscotingprogressive
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am wainscottingprogressive
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are wainscotingprogressive
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are wainscottingprogressive
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is wainscotingprogressive
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is wainscottingprogressive
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have been wainscotingperfect progressive
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have been wainscottingperfect progressive
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has been wainscotingperfect progressive
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has been wainscottingperfect progressive
Past
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wainscotedsimple
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wainscottedsimple
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had wainscotedperfect
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had wainscottedperfect
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was wainscotingprogressive
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was wainscottingprogressive
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were wainscotingprogressive
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were wainscottingprogressive
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had been wainscotingperfect progressive
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had been wainscottingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of wainscot
1325–75; Middle English < Middle Low German or Middle Dutch wagenschot, equivalent to wagen wain + schot (< ?)
Explanation
Wainscot is a type of wood paneling on a room's walls. Wainscot is often made from oak. This word's meaning is hard to figure out from looking at it, but the wains part is from a Dutch word that meant "wagon" and the scot part probably comes from a word that means "partition." Put them together, and you've got a word for wood paneling in a room: usually the kind that goes half-way up the wall. Originally, wainscot was a type of foreign oak imported to Britain for use in paneling, before it came to mean the paneling itself.
Vocabulary lists containing wainscot
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.
See Examples For:
Named for its historic 1920s Chateauesque building, Castle is a treasure box of prewar charm: lattice windows, crown-molding, wainscot, Art Deco tile.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 29, 2024
Install them floor to ceiling or only halfway up as a wainscot, then cap it with a wood chair rail.
From Time ● Mar. 12, 2015
At the push of a button, the lifts open and close, floor-indicator lights blink, and chimes ping, as if an office tower staffed by Lilliputian drones were hidden behind the wainscot.
From Architectural Digest ● Nov. 4, 2014
The walls are covered with red silk damask and decorated with wainscot panelling.
From Economist ● Sep. 18, 2014
They could hear the wood splintering under his teeth—a sound like a mouse in a shed wainscot at midnight.
From "Watership Down: A Novel" by Richard Adams
The parlor and dining room on opposite sides of the hall, the bedrooms above and also the halls all have beautifully paneled wainscots.
From The Colonial Architecture of Philadelphia by Frank Cousins
The walls and wainscots were of red, glazed bricks to the height of a man, and were bordered by a row of flowered tiles.
From The Cabin [La barraca] by Vicente Blasco Ib??ez
I fear the noise made by my men, not to speak of the turning about of your chambers by taking up of boards and trying of wainscots, shall greatly incommode you if you tarry.”
From It Might Have Been The Story of the Gunpowder Plot by M. (Madelaine) Irwin
Now the old house had wainscots behind which the mice were always scampering, and squeaking, and rattling down the plaster, and enacting family scenes and parlor theatricals.
From Life of Oliver Wendell Holmes by E. E. Brown
They broke all my wainscots, pulled up the flooring, and almost wrecked the house the last time they came; and I don’t suppose they will be less vigilant this time.”
From By Conduct and Courage A Story of the Days of Nelson by W. (William) Rainey
As if to underscore the radical turn these artists were making, the paintings are hung on an ornate plum-red wallpaper in a wainscoted gallery that harks back to the Grand Palais’s look.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 25, 2026
Inside, with its wainscoted white walls and dark oak floors, it’s as luxurious and well-appointed as a Four Seasons hotel.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 11, 2025
The gray-on-gray wainscoted dining room is quite pleasant, and so, too, looked the outdoor patio on such a fine summertime’s evening.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 22, 2023
The 10-foot-high ceilings have ornate, botanically themed moldings; the walls are wainscoted; and the floors retain their original geometric two-tone marquetry.
From New York Times ● Feb. 15, 2022
She led Desdemona down a long, wainscoted corridor, through a telephone operator’s office, and into another darker hallway.
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
With a globe on his desk and roll-down maps on the wall of his elegantly wainscotted office, he could be found high in the iconic Chrysler Building in the heart of New York City.
From Salon ● Mar. 22, 2016
The first Hall, which forms the first Piece of the grand Apartment, is all wainscotted, and adorn’d with large Pictures, representing the chief Battles won by Prince Eugene.
The little parlor is wainscotted with the votive paintings—a village Diploma Gallery—of artists who have made the Swan their home.
From Hospital Sketches by Robert Swain Peabody
Next came a vestibule filled with servants, and thence followed the dining hall, wainscotted with sandal wood, inlaid with ivory.
From The Silver Cross or The Carpenter of Nazareth by Eugène Sue
Bolingbroke House was a spacious edifice, said to have contained Bolingbroke house. fifty rooms on a floor, of which a few only remain; among which is the favourite apartment of Lord Bolingbroke, wainscotted with cedar.
From Curiosities of Great Britain: England and Wales Delineated Vol.1-11 Historical, Entertaining & Commercial; Alphabetically Arranged. 11 Volume set. by Thomas Cantrell Dugdale
Other impressive features found in the space included original teak plank flooring, an original marble staircase, and original picture moldings and wainscoting.
From MarketWatch ● Apr. 22, 2026
“Intruders have set fires, burning holes in the floors and scorching wood wainscoting and pews. Empty beef jerky bags, discarded underwear and clumps of plaster litter the worn burgundy carpeting.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 3, 2026
An elegant wainscoting of polished carbon fiber stretches across the four doors, accented with aluminum bezels and wire-thin LED lighting.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 2, 2025
And instead of recessed wall niches, she added shallow, surface-mounted bookshelves over the room’s wainscoting and wallpaper.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 28, 2023
Still, they would be impressed, he hoped, by the lovely bay windows, the shining parquet floors, the impressive winding staircase, the wooden wainscoting, as they sipped champagne and dipped samosas in chutney.
From "Interpreter of Maladies" by Jhumpa Lahiri
Cooke’s friends donated a truckload of 2-by-3s, and he made the wainscotting out of wood from an old fence.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 15, 2022
They fixed up the twenty-six-seat dining room, putting in wainscotting and a bar made from a farmhouse floor.
From The New Yorker ● May 20, 2019
They might be in the wainscotting, but they’re putting it out there.
From New York Times ● Mar. 11, 2014
We are – and you brought us out of the wainscotting like so many freaky old bastards.
From The Guardian ● Mar. 22, 2013
I leant back on the wainscotting with my eyes tightly fixed on him, and my thoughts sneaking back, with something of regret, to the storm I had come through.
From I Saw Three Ships and Other Winter Tales by Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
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.
