Elegance is graceful good taste in style or in thought. Understated elegance, the elegance of the proof, dress with elegance.
Mathematicians and engineers use it as real praise: an elegant solution does the most with the least and could not be simplified further. In dress it means restraint, which is why elegance and display pull against each other.
1nouneleganceGraceful good taste in style or in thought.
“She moved across the room with the elegance of a ballet dancer.”
elegance is a quality.
Latin elegantia comes from elegans, choosing carefully, from eligere, to select.
Latin
ēlegantia — exquisiteness; refinement, elegance
Middle French
élégance
English, today
elegance
From Middle French élégance, from Latin ēlegantia (“exquisiteness; refinement, elegance”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA