From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishwaistwaist /weɪst/ ●●● W3 noun [countable] 1 HBHthe narrow part in the middle of the human body The skirt was too big around the waist.from the waist up/down (=in the top or bottom half of your body) Lota was paralysed from the waist down.stripped to the waist (=not wearing any clothes on the top half of your body)slim-waisted/narrow-waisted/thick-waisted (=having a thin, thick etc waist)2 DCC[usually singular] the part of a piece of clothing that goes around this part of your body ► Do not confuse with waste, which is used as a verb and a noun to talk about using too much of something, or not using it in a sensible way.
Examples from the Corpus
waist• The walls were beige up to about waist level, then turned off-white.• Unaware that she was holding her breath, Isabel slowly slid her arms around his waist.• John slipped his arm around Ixora's narrow waist, guiding her ahead of him.• They were loose around the waist and the legs seemed endless, but the hips fitted nice and snugly.• He pulled, and managed to bend forwards at the waist like an oarsman.• The well-endowed prisoners all strip to the waist and begin sweating and grunting as they struggle to free the craft.• Even a thickening waist, while annoying, can be construed as a viewer problem, to an extent.• The dress emphasized her tiny waist.• He was black from shoes to waist.stripped to the waist• As the day wore on the men stripped to the waist in the burning sun.• I had been following some seals in bright sunshine, stripped to the waist and taking photographs.• Early Salvationists had waded through snake-infested swamps, stripped to the waist, and established huts thatched with palm fronds.• When insulted, they stripped to the waist, put on hideous driftwood masks and sang nasty songs at each other.• He was stripped to the waist, tanned and big-shouldered, in remarkable condition for a man of his age.• Five young men, already in custody, were stripped to the waist.• Many of the men who sat outside the tents were stripped to the waist and some of them were barefoot. 