How to Use umber in a Sentence

umber

noun
  • The rich umber wood used throughout is also a nod to the past.
    — Bridget Arsenault, Forbes, 10 July 2022
  • Black Flowering fountain grass grows two feet tall with dark umber plumes.
    — Karen Hugg, Washington Post, 19 Sep. 2023
  • Embrace the rich hues of brown, black, copper, and umber for unique seasonal charm.
    — Benjamin Vogt, Better Homes & Gardens, 20 Oct. 2025
  • But the sheer weight and scale of the figures’ umber and lead-white modeling banish any light humor.
    — Julian Bell, The New York Review of Books, 26 Dec. 2023
  • Darker skin tones meanwhile can lean right into anything from russet tones to umber.
    — Georgia Day, Vogue, 11 Oct. 2023
  • Wide swatches of umber dirt — fire breaks bulldozed through fields and woods, to cordon the flames off — scar the countryside.
    — Eric Asimov, New York Times, 20 Oct. 2017
  • Diablo,’ or ninebark, its green-umber foliage a stand-in for the painting’s landscape.
    — Lindsey Taylor, WSJ, 7 Aug. 2018
  • So does fall, when the deciduous splendor of the park unveils in washes of gold, red, and umber.
    — Tracey Minkin, Southern Living, 12 July 2023
  • So does fall, when the deciduous splendor of the park unveils in washes of gold, red, and umber.
    — Tracey Minkin, Southern Living, 12 July 2023
  • And two similar shades, a pinkish umber and warm copper, are both in stock at Amazon.
    — Jessica Leigh Mattern, PEOPLE.com, 10 Sep. 2021
  • Shades of umber, khaki, mud, And other greens beside the Malachite.
    — Ciaran Carson, The New Yorker, 12 Aug. 2019
  • The sun was just beginning its ascent over the Mojave, bathing the sand in a smooth umber glow beneath pockets of wispy cloud.
    — Sammy Roth, Anchorage Daily News, 2 July 2023
  • Governor Sarhadi, a spare-looking man with a gray beard, wore a black turban and a short umber shawl, called a patou.
    — Jon Lee Anderson, The New Yorker, 21 Feb. 2022
  • When the umber contents of the skillet are ready, they are swiftly combined with the simmering verdant broth—now, here, roots meet foliage.
    — Kristina Kasparian, Longreads, 12 Nov. 2024
  • The blend of natural and painted woods with a color palette of dusty roses, umbers, and marigolds creates a warm atmosphere.
    — Damian Fallon, Condé Nast Traveler, 22 May 2026
  • Rich marigold and umber can be a great energetic accent hue, while moody burgundy and brown act as a grounding, comforting anchor in a space.
    — Alyssa Longobucco, House Beautiful, 12 Oct. 2022
  • Consider how to design and plan for winter interest, learning to savor the many hues of brown and black, copper and umber in the landscape.
    — Benjamin Vogt, Better Homes & Gardens, 13 Oct. 2023
  • Crafted from oak with an umber finish, its tapered pedestal base and subtle molding lend a quietly traditional feel.
    — Rachel Fletcher, Architectural Digest, 19 June 2026
  • Layered hues from green through shades of golden ocher down to umber—in classic tempera painting, this would be exactly the understructure for (white) skin tones.
    — Moritz Scheper, Artforum, 1 Sep. 2024
  • Chestnut, chocolate, umber—in these deep shades, suede’s supple texture brings dimension to otherwise simple outfits, such as jeans and a winter coat.
    — Shelby Ying Hyde, Glamour, 11 Nov. 2025
  • Her skin was a shade or two darker than Nella's chestnut complexion, falling somewhere between hickory and umber.
    — Rachel Epstein, Marie Claire, 1 June 2021
  • Ultramarine and burnt umber combine into a distinctly sweet and mysterious black.
    — New York Times, 5 Feb. 2020
  • Two decades on, the millennial glisten has given way to organic austerity; the dominant tones are now ocher and umber, turmeric and coffee.
    — Martha Schwendener, New York Times, 13 Mar. 2024
  • Some, of night skies, embed white dots, for stars, in glazes of a dense black, with subliminal admixtures of, Celmins recently told me, ultramarine, raw umber, and ochre.
    — Peter Schjeldahl, The New Yorker, 27 Feb. 2017
  • The last time a yellowish color got the bum’s rush was in 1990, when maize, lemon yellow and orange yellow all went down for the count (along with duds such as raw umber and violet blue).
    — Joe Queenan, WSJ, 6 Apr. 2017
  • Made of amethyst, bone, faience, glass, turquoise, and umber, and including phallic amulets, scarabs, a woman, a dancing satyr, and a head of Dionysus, they are thought to be the treasure box of a sorceress.
    — Rafil Kroll-Zaidi, Harper's magazine, 28 Oct. 2019
  • Other pieces are more delicate — a little cup, for instance, with walls like a fine, crisp shell, nests within another, just slightly larger, to yield an intimate meditation in umber and taupe.
    — Leah Ollman, latimes.com, 5 July 2019
  • The program also covers dragonflies and three special concern species — the cobra clubtail, umber shadowdragon, and stygian — are being delisted.
    — Michael P. Norton, BostonGlobe.com, 16 Aug. 2019
  • In 1990, eight shades — maize, lemon yellow, blue gray, raw umber, green blue, orange red, orange yellow and violet blue — were retired and eight new ones, including the yellow hue known as dandelion, were introduced.
    — Christopher Mele, New York Times, 31 Mar. 2017
  • Shortly after 8, Varsano pressed some buttons in an app on his phone to raise the shades, and the showroom’s gray-and-blue interior flooded with rare London sun, mottled with umber from a hurricane bound for Ireland.
    — Gideon Lewis-Kraus, New York Times, 23 Jan. 2018

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'umber.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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