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I found this sentence on Complex

Amber Rose hangs out with (a) turquoise-haired mystery girl.

I couldn't find 'turquoise-haired' in any dictionary, but a similar construction, "dark-haired", has its place in Collin dictionary.

I don't understand how it's possible to attach the -ed suffix to a noun. Do we have a fancy term for this?

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  • @StoneyB I wonder if there's any term we use for this.
    – user178049
    Sep 5, 2017 at 15:05
  • @user178049 CGEL doesn't have a distinct name for adjectives (other than participles) formed specifically with -ed, but it calls the process, with whatever affix is employed, "adjectivalization" and the resulting words "denominal adjectives" or "denominals".
    – StoneyB on hiatus
    Sep 5, 2017 at 15:39

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This is referred to as a pseudo-participial in English Grammar: A University Course (Downing and Locke, 2006). It's a form of participle derived from a noun. This participle is often modified to represent some non-essential feature.

The true -en participial epithet derived from a verb [...] must be distinguished from pseudo-participials, which are derived from nouns [...]

Such pseudo-participials are often modified, as the modification represents some non-essential feature. We don’t say *a leaved plant, *a haired girl, because plants normally have leaves and girls have hair. Not all leaves are big and not all girls’ hair is dark, however, allowing the formation of big-leaved and dark-haired: a dark-haired girl. In a camera’ed bystander, by contrast, no modifier is needed because carrying a camera is not an essential feature of a bystander.

(p 436)

According to StoneyB, this - ed suffix is a participle form with a passive sense "supplied with" or "equiped with".

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