Trendy

How to spell trendy

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce trendy

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does trendy mean?

1. adjectiveVery fashionable or up to date, in line with the latest styles or ideas.

Trendy in a sentence

• The new cafe on the corner is a trendy spot for young professionals.

• He bought a trendy jacket that everyone seemed to be wearing that season.

Where does trendy come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word is built on 'trend', which traces back to the Old English verb trendan, meaning 'to turn, roll, or revolve'. For centuries 'trend' kept that physical sense of bending or turning in a particular direction, which is why we still speak of a river or a coastline that trends north. By the nineteenth century the noun had drifted into its modern figurative meaning, a general direction in which things are developing, especially in taste and fashion. The adjective 'trendy', formed simply by adding the common '-y' suffix, is a twentieth-century coinage that emerged in British usage around the 1960s to describe whatever was fashionably up to date. Its Germanic roots make the spelling refreshingly regular, the only thing to watch is the doubling of the final consonant when forming related words, though the base 'trendy' itself stays simple.

How the word is built

• trend (from Old English trendan: to turn or roll)
• -y (adjective suffix)