gaudy
Plural: gaudies
Noun
- A celebratory feast or festival, often held in a college.
- (Britain) a celebratory reunion feast or entertainment held a college
- One of the large beads in the rosary at which the paternoster is recited.
- A reunion held by one of the colleges of the University of Oxford for alumni, normally during the long vacation.
Adjective Satellite
- tastelessly showy
- "a gaudy costume"
- (used especially of clothes) marked by conspicuous display
Adj
- Very showy or ornamented, now especially when excessive, or in a tasteless or vulgar manner.
- Fun; merry; festive.
Adjective
- Extravagantly bright or showy, often in a tasteless way.
Examples
- After his Words With Friends win, he felt it was time for a GAUDY to celebrate his linguistic prowess.
- Despite its GAUDY appearance on the board, his opponent’s word only scored five points.
Origin / Etymology
From Middle English gaudi, from Old French gaudie, from Medieval Latin gaudia. equivalent to gaud (“ornament, trinket”) + -y.
Alternatively, from Middle English gaudi, gawdy (“yellowish”), from Old French gaude, galde (“weld (the plant)”), from Frankish *walda, from Proto-Germanic *walþō, *walþijō, akin to Old English *weald, *wielde (>Middle English welde, wolde and Anglo-Latin walda (“alum”)), Middle Low German wolde, Middle Dutch woude. More at English weld.
A common claim that the word derives from Antoni Gaudí, designer of Barcelona's Sagrada Família Basilica, is incorrect: the word was in use centuries before Gaudí was born.
Synonyms
brassy, cheap, flash, flashy, garish, gimcrack, jazzy, loud, meretricious, showy, sporty, tacky, tatty, tawdry, trashy, bedizened, blatant, blingish, brash, catchpenny, chichi, chintzy, crass, crude, flaunting, florid, flossy, froufrou, gauche, gaudy, gay, glaring, gross, gussied up, hideous, kitschy, obtrusive, ostentatious, pizazzy, pretentious, raffish, ritzy, snazzy, splendiferous, tasteless, tinselly, too much, unbecoming, untasteful, vain, whorish, zesty
Antonyms
Scrabble Score: 10
gaudy: valid Scrabble (US) TWL Wordgaudy: valid Scrabble Word in Merriam-Webster MW Dictionary
gaudy: valid Scrabble Word in International Collins CSW Dictionary