hothouse flower
1
8.9
- noun
- /ˈhɔːthaʊs ˈflaʊər/
- Offensive
:
persona sobreprotegida
- His sheltered upbringing made him a hothouse flower, unable to cope with the challenges of living independently.
Examples
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After spending her entire life in a luxury mansion, she was a true hothouse flower who found it hard to adjust to the harsh realities of the outside world.
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Well, aren't you a little hothouse flower.
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They're not hothouse flowers.
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People often called her a hothouse flower because she seemed fragile and struggled to handle any criticism.
Synonyms
A person or thing that is fragile and easily hurt by difficulties
Antonyms
Surface Forms
Morphology
hothouse + flower
The meaning 'a person who is overly delicate or sheltered' is directly derivable from combining 'hothouse' (a protected/greenhouse environment) with 'flower' (a delicate plant): a flower raised in a hothouse is sheltered and fragile, so the metaphor maps straightforwardly onto a person. This is a common cross-linguistic metaphor (protected plant → sheltered person), so a B1 learner who knows the constituent words would likely infer the meaning.
Etymology
Hothouse flower comes from the picture of a delicate plant grown in a warm hothouse, like a greenhouse, where the flower is kept safe and not used to bad weather. So calling someone a hothouse flower means they are 'sheltered' or 'unable to cope' with hard or difficult situations.