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Indeed, it is not a taboo subject anymore! In fact, I frequently read about it in news papers mentioning this as dressing sense or beauty of a woman (I guess there are competitions as well).

Whatever--a dressing sense--or naturally forming 'deep cut', some have it well-defined, others simply show its absence.

Now there could be two opposites in this case and I am searching for both those terms.

A) What's the opposite term for the word 'cleavage' - a woman with absence of cleavage (flat or no cleavage does not convince me).

AND...

B) What's the term that describes opposite of cleavage itself - cleavage is *the space between the organs that can be seen above a dress but then some dresses (not uploading a picture here to keep this site graphically clean) show them from the bottom i.e. below the top (opposite direction)? What's the term for that? Cleavage from Bottom? 'Bottom Cleft' - no way. No word with bottom (#7) can prevent ambiguity here.

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    Perhaps, Cleavageless or Shapeless :)
    – user3214
    Apr 22, 2014 at 6:34
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    @GATA Eh! Found it on Google Book! +1 The sentence reads: I was back in my own clothes, makeup free and cleavageless. I had gone out on stage in front of ...
    – Maulik V
    Apr 22, 2014 at 6:43
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    @GATA It's underboob, just putting here as you were curious and the notification comes in your inbox! :) Not just that, there are innerboob, sideboob as well. Very well searched by chapka.
    – Maulik V
    Apr 22, 2014 at 16:06
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    Fashion industry's glossary is getting bigger and bigger day after day :) I didn't expect even a word but it was actually Comprehensively defined :-)
    – user3214
    Apr 22, 2014 at 16:37
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    It doesn’t exactly answer your question, but the term “décolletage” is borrowed from French by English speakers in order to discuss the neck-down exposure of some garments. In my experience, this word is used to refer to the area of a woman’s chest that is exposed by a garment, usually not referring to cleavage. The Wikipedia article indicates that décolletage is not necessarily exclusive of cleavage, however.
    – Tyler James Young
    Apr 22, 2014 at 16:51

2 Answers 2

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"A woman lacking cleavage" is not the opposite of "cleavage," it's the opposite of "a woman showing cleavage," which there is not a single word for, either.

Not every word--even a word that is "a feature of something"--has a single word you can point to as its "opposite." What is the opposite of "redheaded"? It's "not redheaded." Similarly, the opposite of "showing cleavage" is "not showing cleavage."

Cleavage, as it's used in American English at least, is also not an inherent feature of a woman's body; it's an effect produced in large part by the way the woman is dressed. It doesn't matter how a person's body is shaped; if she is wearing a turtleneck sweater, she is not going to show any "cleavage."

As for cleavage shown at the bottom of the breasts, impeccable source Jezebel calls it "underboob."

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  • BINGO! It's underboob. Thanks a ton buddy. You helped me getting into comfort zone now. This was in some unknown corner of my brain which was making me uncomfortable!
    – Maulik V
    Apr 22, 2014 at 15:37
  • BTW, may I know how did you search it (I want to know the search term) or you already knew the term?
    – Maulik V
    Apr 22, 2014 at 15:41
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I think cleavage is simply a thing. It is the space between a woman's breasts. I don't think it has an opposite. It is like asking what the opposite of "pencil" is.

Cleavageless seems kind of constructed to me. I would understand it if I read it or if I heard it in conversation, but I don't think it is technically a word and I don't think you would find it in many dictionaries.

This happens sometimes. Native speakers will add suffixes to certain words and just create their own words when they cannot think of a better word. I've seen this with -less, -ful, -y, and several other suffixes.

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  • It's a feature of something and thus can have some term opposite to that. Also, there's another concern as well. If we accept cleavage as a cleavage, what about its opposite in terms of its exposure? A cleft seen from the bottom?
    – Maulik V
    Apr 22, 2014 at 9:14

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