France has most (or a significant percentage) of the leading fashion houses and cosmetic brands. So it makes sense.

> France has most (or a significant percentage) of the leading fashion houses and cosmetic brands. So it makes sense.

Also, I think French words (in general) have associations of "high class" and "fashionable" in the American context, so calling something by a French word is an easy way for a marketer to fancy something up (for certain classes of something).

French association with "high class" goes a long ways back, including to when Brittania was under Norman rule in the early 1000s.

Much of the loan words from Old French are considered classier compared to equivalent words from Old english

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_with_dua...

Exactly. This is most likely the cause.

There are no English words of non-French origin for many of these; it's not a marketing tactic: it's just the only way to denote e.g. boucle fabric or chenille yarn.

I attempted to learn French at one point and one thing I realized is that fancy words in English are frequently their direct translation in French. I assume this comes from royalty generally speaking both English and French. If there's a French user here, do you know if the reverse happened too?

Arguably goes back to the Norman conquest. You muck about in the fields with the Germanic swine but eat the French-derived pork. You raise cows but eat beef. Likewise mutton.

Military words also tend to come from French, which is how they got to be eating those fine foods.

But remember, the French have no word for entrepreneur :) [1]

[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisoncoleman/2014/02/14/entrep...

Damn, that's a stupid article - another one - from Forbes. Entrepreneur is a French word, and entreprise is company in French. Jean-Baptiste Say coined the word 250 years ago. https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/08/origin-of-entrep...

For context: She's starting off the article with that obviously false malapropism sometimes attributed to George W. Bush as a springboard to talk about entrepreneurship in France, and it's clear that she is using it as a joke.

Indeed. It's tongue-in-cheek. As an aside, I heard a rumour it was Regan, not Bush who first uttered it. As a second side, I'm not sure it's technically a malapropism.

Also other words relating to those in charge, like "government", "minister" and "crown".