Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Worn out from long use or neglect; dilapidated.
- adj. Shabbily dressed because of poverty; seedy.
Wiktionary
- adj. Attributive form of down at heel.
Examples
“From there I'd suggest heading to Ueno, a slightly down-at-heel area, built around a park, that still has a faintly rural feel and reminds you of what Tokyo used to be when its Meiji refashioners, in the late 19th century, took their cues from London and Paris.”
“Puppets mingle with live performers – P&J are now two down-at-heel vaudevillians – as creativity is put in the dock and the show goes to Hell crocodiles and sausages still included.”
“It helped too to have a cast stuffed with big-name stars and acclaimed character actors, including Dustin Hoffman as fresh-out-of-jail gangster Chester "Ace" Bernstein, Dennis Farina as his right-hand man, Nick Nolte as a down-at-heel trainer, and Michael Gambon as Bernstein's old foe.”
The Guardian: After John From Cincinatti, David Milch spies a change in his Luck
“Lebedev celebrated his 49th birthday in the down-at-heel offices of Novaya Gazeta, the liberal Moscow newspaper he part owns with Mikhail Gorbachev.”
“Unsurprisingly, the likes of Mike Skinner feel a kinship with GP's down-at-heel rhyming – however dark the work can be, there's a feeling of a torch being passed.”
“Suspicion soon alighted on a young, down-at-heel German-born tailor called Franz Muller, and Mr Briggs' Hat is a compelling read because innocent explanations are gradually posited for the following, apparently damning facts: that Muller was found in possession of Briggs's watch and possibly his hat; that the hat left in the carriage was also traced to him; that he sailed to America just days after the killing.”
“Why Once Scotland's most popular seaside town, Rothesay, on this island 15 miles long by four wide and two hours' drive from Glasgow, is now full of down-at-heel charm.”
“Back when I was young, it was a really down-at-heel place, with hassle and trouble wherever you went, but now it's really pulled itself up by its bootstraps.”
“In Owton Manor, a down-at-heel suburb in the south-west of the town, things are even worse.”
The Guardian: How the north of England has suffered most in the downturn
“Small, roll-up curtains reveal four colorful rooms behind the facade, one each for the preening stepsisters Clorinda and Tisbe downstairs, and two upstairs for their harrumphing father Don Magnifico, the down-at-heel Baron of Montefiascone, while sweet and sprightly Angelina gets the cinders and the scullery in the middle.”
The Wall Street Journal: 'La Cenerentola' Sparkles on the Paris Stage
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘down-at-heel’.
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Ptolemy's Gate
Words and phrases from Jonathan Stroud's book, Ptolemy's Gate.
fall afoul, fleet, tamarisk, krait, inkstone, hotted up, down-market, have a truck with, brio, fatalistic, knock-kneed, conserve and 210 more...
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