WORD OF THE DAY: PATINA
noun | puh-TEE-nuh
A patina is a usually green film that forms on copper and bronze that is exposed to moist air for an extended time. The word patina can also refer to a shiny or dark surface that over time forms naturally on something (such as wood or leather), or to a literal or figurative thin layer.
// The town erected a statue in her honor, which over the years developed a seafoam green patina.
// Although the winery is brand-new, it has been constructed and decorated to give it a patina of old-world quaintness.
EXAMPLE OF PATINA
“Family, friends and neighbors filled the frames with dancing and dominoes; their apartments painted in shades of mint, butter yellow and … pink, flecked with a patina cultivated by humidity and time.” — Suzy Exposito, The Los Angeles Times, 28 July 2026
DID YOU KNOW?
When Italians applied the word patina to the green film that forms on the surface of copper, they were drawing from Latin, in which patina means “a shallow dish.” (Presumably, the Italian meaning developed from the observation of such film forming on copper dishes.) By the mid-18th century, English speakers were also calling the green film patina, and by the 20th century, they’d expanded the word’s application to surface appearances of things that have grown more beautiful with age or use—think of an old wooden desk or a tarnished silver goblet. Use of the word to refer to thin layers both literal and figurative (“a patina of grime,” “a patina of respectability”) followed soon after. The related verb patinate means “to give a patina to.”
Merriam Webster Dictionary
