dressing up

verb

present participle of dress up
1
as in dressing
to put on one's best or formal clothes we always like to dress up when going to parties

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2
as in disguising
to change the dress or looks of so as to conceal true identity the war was a fiasco that the administration tried to dress up as a triumph

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms
3
as in sprucing
to make more desirable dressed up the house with new windows and a paint job before putting it on the market

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4
as in clothing
to outfit with clothes and especially fine or special clothes the girls were dressed up in skirts or dresses, but the boys were wearing jeans

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of dressing up Some edtech has developed its own flavor of that problem by dressing up excessive gamification as a motivation system. — Richard Carranza, Forbes.com, 23 July 2026 Today, dressing up as an athlete, the same as in any public-facing career, is an unavoidable profile-raising effort. — Leah Dolan, CNN Money, 15 July 2026 Summerween treats dressing up as a warm-weather activity, no trick-or-treating required. — Hanna Wickes, Miami Herald, 8 July 2026 Fair highlights Despite the ongoing issues, the sparse number of visitors entertained themselves with interactive exhibits, like dressing up as former President George Washington or speaking with an actress portraying Betsy Ross. — Michelle Del Rey, USA Today, 26 June 2026 Best Petite Work Pants on Amazon Not to be overly dramatic, but dressing up for the office is basically my nightmare. — Jamie Allison Sanders, PEOPLE, 18 June 2026 Rachel Smith, co-organizer of the convention and co-founder of Mermaid and Mom, a mermaid party entertainment business, told The Sacramento Bee in 2025 that the California Mermaid Convention brings together water enthusiasts who care for the environment and love dressing up. — Don Sweeney, Sacbee.com, 14 May 2026 Bad Bunny went full costume, carrying a cane and dressing up as an older version of himself with gray hair and special effects makeup to add years to his face. — Beatrice Dupuy, Chicago Tribune, 5 May 2026 Spiegelman uses the term micro-looting, dressing up petty theft in political pretensions. — Thomas Chatterton Williams, The Atlantic, 23 Apr. 2026
Recent Examples of Synonyms for dressing up
  1. dressing
  2. disguising
  3. sweetening
  4. clothing
  5. masking
  6. improving
  7. doing up
  8. camouflaging
Verb
  • Temperatures outside climbed into the upper 90s, but the heat did little to discourage guests from dressing for what had become one of the summer’s most important social events.
    — Kansas City Star, Kansas City Star, 28 July 2026
  • Baggy jeans have an inherent low-key sensibility, so dressing them up with some sophisticated heels is ideal for a casual night out.
    — Kevin Huynh, InStyle, 26 July 2026
Definition of dressing
Verb
  • Nail concealer is an alternative to traditional nail polish that helps improve nails while disguising imperfections.
    — Alexis Berger, InStyle, 25 July 2026
  • That can remove visual boundaries, disguising any lines that would otherwise truncate your walls.
    — Andee Tagle, NPR, 19 July 2026
Definition of disguising
Verb
  • Rob McDaniel, executive chef of Bayonet and Helen in Birmingham, Alabama, supports this idea for sweetening your tea.
    — Taylor Tobin, Southern Living, 18 July 2026
  • But my favorite might be the slaw dog, with coleslaw cooling and sweetening the slightly spicy chili beneath.
    — USA TODAY Network, USA Today, 15 July 2026
Definition of sweetening
Verb
  • Not feeding the hungry, not tending to the sick, not clothing the naked, not welcoming the refugee.
    — Alexandra Petri, The Atlantic, 17 June 2026
  • This is like inviting a homeless person into your home, sheltering them, feeding them, clothing them, educating them, and having that person's confidant leak that the newly comfortable person doesn't think less of you.
    — Armando Salguero OutKick, FOXNews.com, 22 May 2026
Definition of clothing
Verb
  • If personal information appears in a report, the response may be masking, restricted access or retention review.
    — Saurabh Gupta, Forbes.com, 23 July 2026
  • Telling people to mask or stay at home doesn’t stop transmission; masking and staying at home do stop transmission.
    — Marc Lipsitch, STAT, 21 July 2026
Definition of masking
Verb
  • Corson said raising the minimum wage and building more housing are both part of the solution for improving affordability.
    — Matthew Kelly, Kansas City Star, 22 July 2026
  • By selling more games digitally, the company has less need to manufacture physical boxes, and physical discs are eliminated completely, improving profit margins.
    — Lim Hui Jie, CNBC, 22 July 2026
Definition of improving
Verb
  • What in the world are those overgrown basketballs doing up there?
    — Rui Bo, The Conversation, 18 May 2026
  • Wednesday’s practice started with some of the players doing up-downs after forgetting equipment.
    — Anthony Solorzano, Los Angeles Times, 26 Mar. 2026
Definition of doing up
Verb
  • Over decades, the tides shift surrounding sand while marine life, like algae, grows over the device, camouflaging it into the natural ocean environment.
    — Mrigakshi Dixit, Interesting Engineering, 3 July 2026
  • It can be used as a concealer, contour, or foundation, has medium coverage, is pore-blurring, texture-smoothing, and imperfection-camouflaging.
    — Tamim Alnuweiri, InStyle, 26 June 2026
Definition of camouflaging

Browse Nearby Words

dressings
dressing up
dress rehearsal
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Cite this Entry

“Dressing up.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/dressing%20up. Accessed 28 Jul. 2026.

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