taut

And Spain’s taut, 2-1 victory over Belgium in Friday’s high-stakes quarterfinals match.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 11, 2026

Grasping a pair of dark grey trousers, it raised its upper body to stretch the fabric taut, before laying it flat and arranging it into neat halves.

From Barron's ● Jun. 11, 2026

Trunk, branches, leaves and night sky form an intricate pattern, creating the taut balance between image and abstract form that O’Keeffe was achieving in many of her paintings of the 1920s.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 20, 2026

My wife and I were in Paris during the tragedy and a decade later, the emotional tether I feel to the city remains taut.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 14, 2026

Bows groaned as the archers on the mezzanine pulled their strings taut.

From "Throne of Glass" by Sarah J. Maas

With judicious trimming, particularly of the occasional puddle of expository or repetitive dialogue, the play would gain a tauter pace.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 26, 2025

The pacing is tauter this year, and more tense.

From New York Times ● Aug. 1, 2023

The device, called CoolSculpting, was entering an already-crowded beauty industry selling flatter stomachs and tauter jawlines, but it had an advantage: a vaunted scientific pedigree.

From Seattle Times ● Apr. 17, 2023

Could “Lessons” have been a few instructions tauter?

From Washington Post ● Apr. 5, 2022

And once more there was silence; and the expectancy, momentarily relaxed, was stretched again, tauter, tauter, almost to the tearing point.

From "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley

The strongest, tautest story in the collection is “The Haunting of Hajji Hotak,” again told in second person, this time from the perspective of a government surveillant.

From New York Times ● Jul. 19, 2022

One of the tautest exchanges took place when Ose challenged Faulconer’s record on dealing with homelessness, a cornerstone of the former mayor’s campaign.

From Seattle Times ● Aug. 4, 2021

Although it doesn’t rule out backup like horns and singers, “Look Now” channels Mr. Costello’s stylistic wanderings back into his tautest rock-band format.

From New York Times ● Sep. 12, 2018

Affleck bested Denzel Washington, who starred and directed in “Fences;” the look on his face when Affleck’s name was read speaks as forcefully as any of August Williams’ tautest phrases.

From Salon ● Feb. 27, 2017

The jib, mainsail, and gaff topsail are hauled up to their very tautest; finally, the cable is slipped, and then old Sandy for the first time looks around.

From Lippincott's Magazine, October 1885 by Various