dowdy

Especially because, with this dull, dowdy current iteration dragging its cape into theaters, it already has.

From Salon ● Jun. 27, 2026

The company also saw that its selection was dowdy and uninspiring.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 19, 2026

She wore dowdy skirts with equally drab cardigans.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 19, 2024

The character of Dame Edna began as a dowdy Mrs. Norm Everage, who first took to the stage in Humphries’ hometown of Melbourne in the mid-1950s.

From Seattle Times ● Apr. 22, 2023

She was trying on her latest disguise—a dowdy gown of dull gray—and her hair was swept back in a severe bun with just a few curls loose at the temples.

From "The Detective's Assistant" by Kate Hannigan

The actress dowdies up her portrayal with a glumly unsmiling demeanor and the flat, poignantly cynical vocal delivery of the nerd who’s smarter — and more annoying — than everyone else in the room.

From Washington Post ● Oct. 20, 2016

Julie Andrews, Carol Channing, Ann Margret, Jane Fonda, Vanessa Redgrave and Raquel Welch are the other distinguished dowdies, but it's not really their fault.

From Time Magazine Archive

Oh, anything to get away from the dowagers and the dowdies.

From A Woman of No Importance by Oscar Wilde

Lady Howard, indeed! why, do you think I'd wear one of her dowdies?

From Evelina, Or, the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World by Fanny Burney

Dowdies, dowdies won't do for European courts, Paris especially.

From Women of America Woman: In all ages and in all countries Vol. 10 (of 10) by John Rouse Larus

Investors are finding refuge in dowdier names that have been ignored of late, like peanut butter maker J.M.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 10, 2026

It remains to be seen whether Americans will be more willing to wear dowdier, less comfortable but more effective masks to protect themselves and others.

From Washington Times ● Nov. 27, 2020

After more than a decade of celebrity glitz and lavishly underwritten partying, Saturday’s White House Correspondents’ Association dinner is shaping up to be a slimmed-down, more sober, slightly dowdier affair.

From Washington Post ● Apr. 26, 2017

It occupies a purpose-built new building, a great whorl of glass and golden stone, a few hundred yards from the PPE philosophers’ dowdier premises.

From The Guardian ● Feb. 23, 2017

And the dowdier the ladies and the less he had to do with them the prouder were they.

From A Traitor's Wooing by Headon Hill

It was arguably the dowdiest of Britain’s major charities — its highest-profile patron has long been Princess Anne, Queen Elizabeth’s daughter.

From New York Times ● Jul. 14, 2018

Even in a down economy there's no shortage of potential buyers for even the dowdiest of franchises.

From Seattle Times ● Jul. 17, 2010

The first-class waiting-room is dull to a fearful degree, and furnished in the dowdiest style of economy. 

From Rides on Railways by Samuel Sidney

This night the actors came on the stage in more—or less—than ordinary dress; as men look when they have put on their dowdiest, for bad weather or dirty work: and these men wore their hats.

From Tired Church Members by Anna Bartlett Warner

I should be obliged if I could have leave from next Tuesday, as otherwise I shall not be able to attend the sales, and my Sam Browne is quite the dowdiest in tho whole battalion.

From Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 152, January 31, 1917 by Various