Pick the semi-common, silly-sounding word "primp" when you want to subtly laugh at the ridiculousness of someone spending too much time or energy getting themselves looking good.

Talk about people primping themselves, or primping their hair, or just plain primping. That's typically how we use the word.

But we can also say that someone primps someone else: "She stood beside her husband, primping his hair before the interview."

And, we can get figurative and talk about, say, primping a vehicle, or a meal to be photographed, or a resume. Here's the New York Times: "Residents... are primping their potato vines and grooming their geraniums." And here's the New Yorker: "Already, dutiful undertakers are hard at work primping [the corpse of white Anglo-Saxon Protestant political power] for burial." That last one was weird, not gonna lie. But you get the idea: you can primp anything abstract if you're fussing over it, making it appear just so.

"After my Saturday night bath, I set my hair on rag rollers. This was the first time I'd gone to such bother since leaving Iowa. But I'd decided that Easter was a good time for such primping.''
  — Kirby Larson, Hattie Big Sky, 2006

"One of the most popular goddesses was Aphrodite... She was commonly portrayed primping at her mirror, fixing her hair or adjusting her sandal... Her worshipers repeated these gestures in front of her idol as a form of veneration."
  — Staff, Time, 2 February 1968

has this page helped you understand "primp"?

Awesome, I'm glad it helped!

Thanks for letting me know!
If you have any questions about this term, please message me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com.

study it:

Explain the meaning of "primp" without saying "groom yourself" or "get all dolled up."

try it out:

In The Hunger Games, before Katniss enters a brutal televised competition, she is primped by a stylist in charge of costume design, along with his three assistants who perfect her hair, skin, nails, and makeup. 

Katniss hates all that primping.

How about you? Would you love, hate, or just tolerate being primped by a team of four experts if you were about to go on television? Why?

If you like, use this space to write. (To save your work, copy and paste it into an email or a document.)

before you review, play:

Try to spend 20 seconds or more on the game below. Don’t skip straight to the review—first, let your working memory empty out.

Our game this month is "Coaxed into a Haiku!"

I'll give you the basics of a news story, and you boil the story down into a haiku. You can check out some examples here.

Feel free to take full creative license, omitting or warping the facts, adding dialogue, using slang, cursing, and/or burying the lede. Just do your best to fit the story into a three-line poem of 5, 7, and 5 syllables, respectively.

Try this one today...

"Students create record-breaking blanket fort covering 14,000 feet for local foster kids. The halls were made of metal pipes, and the ceilings were made of sheets… but for one weekend, hundreds of foster care children from Nevada were able to enjoy a blanket fort fit for royalty... The massive structure stretched across two large gymnasiums and a hallway."
  — Katherine Gross, Guinness World Records, 4 June 2026

To see one possible haiku, scroll all the way down.

review this word:

1. The opposite of PRIMP could be

A. FLATTEN.
B. DISHEVEL.
C. UNDERSTATE.

2. The New York Times described a neighborhood like this: "The streets felt deserted because many of these showcase homes have wealthy absentee owners who visit intermittently. Indeed, the only people... encountered were _____ engaged in the endless primping of these architectural beauties."

A. Amazon delivery drivers
B. landscapers and tradespeople
C. subdued and sunburnt tourists

Answers to the review questions: 1. B 2. B From the game: If you're happy with your haiku, then you succeeded! Here's mine:    Two gyms, one hallway,    who knows how many blankets:    Epic fort for kids.

a final word:

I hope you're enjoying Make Your Point. It's made with love. I'm Liesl Johnson, a reading and writing tutor on a mission to explore, illuminate, and celebrate words. From my blog: On vocabulary...       36 ways to study words.       Why we forget words, & how to remember them.       How to use sophisticated words without being awkward. On writing...       How to improve any sentence.       How to motivate our kids to write.       How to stop procrastinating and start writing.       How to bulk up your writing when you have to meet a word count. From my heart: a profound thanks to the generous patrons, donors, and sponsors that make it possible for me to write these emails. If you'd like to be a patron or a donor, please click here. If you'd like to be a sponsor and include your ad in an issue, please contact me at Liesl@HiloTutor.com. A disclaimer: When I write definitions, I use plain language and stick to the words' common, useful applications. If you're interested in authoritative and multiple definitions of words, I encourage you to check a dictionary. Also, because I'm American, I stick to American English when I share words' meanings, usage, and pronunciations; these elements sometimes vary across world Englishes.