becoming

1. 1
   verb

   Present participle and gerund of become.

   The neighborhood is becoming a popular spot for young families.

   Their conversation was becoming tense by the minute.

   Note

   The -ing form of a linking verb, so it nearly always needs something after it: becoming tense, becoming a popular spot. The same spelling also serves as an adjective built on become's sense of suiting someone, the "flattering" adjective. The two are easy to tell apart, because only the adjective takes more and most. A more becoming dress flatters; a dress becoming popular is changing.

2. 2
   adjective

   Attractive and well-suited to the wearer or occasion; flattering in appearance.

   The soft lamplight was becoming, smoothing every line on her face.

   He found her quiet modesty thoroughly becoming.

   Similarflattering, attractive, fetching, comely

   Oppositeunflattering, unbecoming, unattractive

   Note

   The adjective of become's sense "to look attractive on," so what is becoming suits a particular person rather than being beautiful in general. It is said mostly of clothes, colors and light, and it takes on for the person flattered. In Lucy Caldwell's These Days (2022), a salesgirl recommends a lipstick as "very becoming on sallower skin."

   That shade is very becoming on you.

   The shorter cut is more becoming on him than the old one.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   The act or process by which something comes into being or changes into what it is.

   Philosophers have long debated the nature of becoming and change.

   For Heraclitus, all reality exists in a constant state of becoming.

   Similarflux, emergence

   Oppositebeing

   Note

   A philosopher's noun, usually uncountable. It names change itself, set against static being, rather than any one particular change. It can still be counted when a writer wants to stress repetition. Una Chung's Contagion of Living (2007) speaks of "further becomings and unbecomings and rebecomings," plurals that treat identity as a series of transformations rather than a single arrival.

4. 4
   adjective

   Decent and respectable; appropriate to good conduct or manners.

   Such rudeness is hardly becoming in a public official.

   She accepted the award with becoming humility.

   Similarfitting, proper, seemly, appropriate, decorous

   Oppositeunseemly, improper, unbecoming, inappropriate

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