Ultimately, about the (semi-technical, commercial) categories of the clothing industries: named types of Xwear that mostly lack labels in everyday language. (Parallel in many ways to the categories of the household supplies industries, with named types of Xware.) But first:
On my Facebook feed yesterday, this ad for men’s lounge shorts (a type of outerwear) from the Nice Laundry company:
(#1) “The Palms Lounge Short”; from their ad: “The most comfortable lounge shorts ever featuring 4-way stretch nylon with soft Micromodal® interior. Made in the shade.”
— which caught my eye for two reasons. First, the label lounge short (with the commercial singular usage; from other companies, lounge shorts, with the everyday plural usage); I didn’t recall having previously experienced lounge as a modifier naming a type of short(s) before. Second, the gorgeous pattern (of palm fronds), rivaling some gorgeous floral patterns for men’s underwear — briefs, boxers, jockstraps — that had been appearing on my Facebook page recently. (As for colors, the Nice Laundry company offers lounge shorts in everything from the plainest of solid black and navy blue through various more arresting solid colors and patterns to the palms.)
