Definition of "fashion"

The huge square box, parquet-floored and high-ceilinged, had been arranged to display a suite of bedroom furniture designed and made in the halcyon days of the last quarter of the nineteenth century, when modish taste was just due to go clean out of fashion for the best part of the next hundred years.

1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 1, in The China Governess‎

the innocent diversions in fashion

1693, [John Locke], “§208”, in Some Thoughts Concerning Education, London: […] A[wnsham] and J[ohn] Churchill, […]

As now existing, fashion is a form of social regulation analogous to constitutional government as a form of political regulation.

1874-1896, Herbert Spencer, Principles of Sociology Part IV

When it had advanced from the wood, it hopped much after the fashion of a kangaroo, using its hind feet and tail to propel it, and when it stood erect, it sat upon its tail.

1918 September–November, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Land That Time Forgot”, in The Blue Book Magazine, Chicago, Ill.: Story-press Corp.; republished as chapter V, in Hugo Gernsback, editor, Amazing Stories, (please specify |part=I, II, or III), New York, N.Y.: Experimenter Publishing, 1927,

It shell-shocked the home crowd, who quickly demanded a response, which came midway through the half and in emphatic fashion.

2011 October 1, Phil Dawkes, “Sunderland 2 - 2 West Brom”, in BBC Sport‎

Ophelia: My lord, he hath importuned me with love in honourable fashion.Lord Polonius: Ay, fashion you may call it; go to, go to.

c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene ii]

The fashion of his countenance was altered.

1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], Luke 9:29

I do not like the fashion of your garments.

c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene vi]

I have three gourds which I fill with water and take back to my cave against the long nights. I have fashioned a spear and a bow and arrow, that I may conserve my ammunition, which is running low.

1918, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Land That Time Forgot Chapter IX

[…] a device fashioned by arguments against that kind of prey.

2005, Plato, translated by Lesley Brown, Sophist, page 235b

Fashioned plate sells for more than its weight.

1691, [John Locke], Some Considerations of the Consequences of the Lowering of Interest, and Raising the Value of Money. […], London: […] Awnsham and John Churchill, […], published 1692

Laws ought to be fashioned unto the manners and conditions of the people.

1596 (date written; published 1633), Edmund Spenser, A Vewe of the Present State of Irelande […], Dublin: […] Societie of Stationers, […]; republished as A View of the State of Ireland […] (Ancient Irish Histories), Dublin: […] Society of Stationers, […] Hibernia Press, […] [b]y John Morrison, 1809,

Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit; All with me's meet that I can fashion feet.

c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act I, scene ii]