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shapely

[shayp-lee] / ˈʃeɪp li /


Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

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Unassuming from the outside, the shop opens into a huge ark of mortar-crusted brick and ribcage-like beams, with long dining tables displaying shapely vases, pitchers, teacups and plates in shades of apricot, amber and malachite.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 17, 2026

But as the dance progressed, a certain softness prevailed, reinforced by the choreography’s buttery pliés, shapely arms and softly bent knees in leg extensions.

From New York Times ● Mar. 21, 2024

“It’s a Urania Klein,” my friend said, as he lifted the shapely antique typewriter from his car trunk.

From Slate ● Mar. 16, 2024

He says he took the above photo when "like so many others that day and on countless days before us, we rested awhile at Sycamore Gap admiring the tree's shapely tenacity and vigour".

From BBC ● Dec. 29, 2023

Liyana’s eyes fell upon a small, shapely green lamp, exactly the color of the green grass she missed back home in the United States—who ever thought about grass when you had it?

From "Habibi" by Naomi Shihab Nye

Raimi was capable of shapelier storytelling than this.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 10, 2026

The documentary could have been shapelier and better focused, but it packs lots of information and even more emotion.

From Washington Post ● Apr. 4, 2023

A leaner show with a shapelier through line might have been made by centering the series on any one of the journalists who hustle across the screen.

From The New Yorker ● Jun. 18, 2018

The purest white and deepest black meet in her glittering glance      And shapelier than the black-eyed maids of Paradise is she.

From The Book of the Thousand Nights and One Night, Volume II by John Payne

Haply her truant tresses mock Some coronal of shapelier block, To wit, the bounding billy-cock.

From The Book of Humorous Verse by Carolyn Wells

It is hard not to fall in love with a beautiful, brilliant creature who changes genders while galloping across three centuries on a pair of “the shapeliest legs” in the land.

From New York Times ● Feb. 7, 2019

U.S. women, who are credited with having the shapeliest legs in the world, last week faced the horrifying knowledge that soon they would have to go silk-stockingless.

From Time Magazine Archive

In Hatfield Peverel, England, the Rev. Brian Mahood judged a women's ankle-beauty contest, then took off his socks and won the prize for the shapeliest male ankles.

From Time Magazine Archive

At this time there were many growing up to be men in Midfirth; Skald-Torfa dwelt at Torfa's-stead in those days; her son was called Bessi, he was the shapeliest of men and a good skald.

From The Story of Grettir the Strong by William Morris

These jagged cliffs that flout the air, Harsh granite rocks, so rudely bare, Wise Vulcan's art and mine shall own To piles of shapeliest beauty grown.

From Mosaics of Grecian History by Marcius Willson


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