Definition of "mignonette" [mi•gnon•ette]

• Any of several Mediterranean plants of the genus Reseda, especially R. odorata, widely cultivated for its terminal, dense, spikelike clusters of very fragrant but inconspicuous greenish flowers. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Either she would be very severe, flat back and front, or she would be tall, fair, dressed in mignonette green, name – Daisy, and smelling of rather sweetish lavender water."
• "In order to break up extremes of colours you can always use masses of white flowers, or something like mignonette, which is in effect green."
• "In the garden-borders the mignonette is a very inconspicuous little plant, and passes almost unnoticed beside the flaunting gaudiness of the dahlia or the showy spikes of the hollyhock, yet it is from that modest, low-growing, grey-green flower that comes the sweetness that perfumes the whole air, for the most optimistic person would hardly expect fragrance from dahlias or hollyhocks."