picturesque Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. adjective satellite suggesting or suitable for a picture; pretty as a picture
    • a picturesque village
  2. adjective satellite strikingly expressive
    • a picturesque description of the rainforest

WordNet

Pic`tur*esque" adjective
Etymology
It. pittoresco: cf. F. pittoresque. See Pictorial.
Definitions
  1. Forming, or fitted to form, a good or pleasing picture; representing with the clearness or ideal beauty appropriate to a picture; expressing that peculiar kind of beauty which is agreeable in a picture, natural or artificial; graphic; vivid; as, a picturesque scene or attitude; picturesque language.
    What is picturesque as placed in relation to the beautiful and the sublime? It is . . . the characteristic pushed into a sensible excess. De Quincey.
    -- Pic`tur*esque"ly, adv. -- Pic`tur*esque"ness, n.

Webster 1913