loft
/lɒft
/noun
1A room or space directly under the roof of a house or other building, used for accommodation or storage: the best way to prevent this heat loss is by insulating the loft [as modifier]: loft conversions...
- Graham spent the bulk of his day today sorting out the junk in the garage, creating a boarded storage loft in the roof space, and separating out a couple of loads of rubbish to go to the recycling centre tomorrow.
- Beyond the ground floor, however, the transformation of the office building into lofts has taken a controversial turn.
- In the rear of a house just half a block away from my house, there was a three-garage outbuilding with storage lofts above each garage.
1.1A gallery in a church or hall: a choir loft...
- The choir loft was still behind the pulpit, but there was a drum set, a keyboard, and guitars set up to the left of the podium.
- From the choir loft, we had a wonderful view as the Paschal fire spread out among the people, lighting from one candle to the next, dispersing the gloom of darkness.
- In the first half of this church sequence, Cole is playing with his soldiers in the choir loft when Malcolm comes in.
1.2A large, open area in a warehouse, factory, or other large building that has been converted into living space.That space consists largely of residential blocks and light industrial space and warehousing easily converted to lofts, on the eastern side of the city....
- In recent years, developers had considered converting the building into lofts, but a deal did not materialize.
- She raved about how she could convert the factory space into a fabulous loft for herself.
1.3A pigeon house.Duramitex is a concentrate that needs diluting and is used to clean out pigeon lofts and hen houses....
- Dr Hansell said pigeon flocks had been successfully reduced in the Swiss city of Basle without a single bird being killed, using a combination of pigeon lofts and egg-removal methods.
- The Scottish Homing Union, which represents the owners of 4000 pigeon lofts in Scotland, vows to ‘tear this document to shreds’.
1.4US Part of a room on a higher level than the rest of the room.Other getaway realms include the loft and the lower level.
2 [mass noun] Golf Upward inclination given to the ball in a stroke.This less-steep inside approach also adds loft at impact and improves her accuracy....
- Most poor putters hit the ball too much on the upswing - they add loft to the putter on the stroke.
- For an uphill bunker shot, use less loft and make a normal swing.
2.1Backward slope of the head of a club, designed to give upward inclination to the ball: the extra loft reduces sidespin...
- Generally, each degree of loft on your wedges translates to two to four yards in carry distance.
- Use the loft of the club to get the ball up in the air.
- Good bunker play comes from good technique, not the loft of the club.
3 [mass noun] The thickness of insulating matter in an object such as a sleeping bag.
verb
1 [with object and adverbial of direction] Kick, hit, or throw (a ball or missile) high up: he lofted the ball over the goalkeeper...
- A boundary was more likely than a three and Giles came down the wicket and tried to loft the ball over the in-field on the leg-side.
- The first was to loft the ball over the bar for one of the finest points he has ever scored and probably the most important.
- A coach lofts the ball at the rim to simulate an errant shot, and the drill is on.
2 [with object] (usually as adjective lofted) Give backward slope to the head of (a golf club): a lofted metal club...
- Because of the long iron's comparative lack of loft, any sidespin created with your swing will be accentuated, because the ball doesn't crawl up the face as much as it does on a club with a more lofted face.
- That means sometimes playing a more lofted club, to get over a ridge, or on double-breakers, flying the ball far enough to eliminate the first break.
- As the ball gets deeper in the grass, you should automatically reach for a more lofted club.
Origin
Late Old English, from Old Norse lopt 'air, sky, upper room', of Germanic origin; related to Dutch lucht and German Luft.
In Old English loft meant ‘air, sky’ as well as what was up in the air, an upper room. It comes from Old Norse, and shares a Germanic root with lift (Old English). Sky (Middle English) was also a borrowing from Scandinavian and originally meant ‘cloud’. The word was applied to a shade of blue in the mid 17th century; the phrase out of a clear blue sky, for something as unexpected as rain or thunder out of such a sky, made its appearance towards the end of the 19th century; the sky's the limit dates from the 1920s. When Anglo-Saxons wanted to talk about the sky they could also use the word wolcen, welkin in modern English, but now only used in the expression to make the welkin ring.