spruce

plural spruces

1. countableuncountableAny of various large coniferous evergreen trees or shrubs from the genus Picea, found in northern temperate and boreal regions; originally and more fully spruce fir.
2. uncountableThe wood of a spruce.
3. attributivecountableuncountableMade of the wood of the spruce.

   That spruce table is beautiful!

4. countableobsoleteuncountablePrussian leather; pruce.

comparative sprucer · superlative sprucest

1. comparableSmart, trim, and elegant in appearance; fastidious (said of a person).

   The two clean rooms, where chips are made, are sprucer than a hospital theatre.

   2012 October 13, “Plessey returns: Chips with everything”, in The Economist, London: The Economist Group, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 13 Oct 2012

   4 more examples

   Hovv often vvould the Svvaines prepare their Morrice & their May / To haue a ſight of her, vvhen all enamoured vvent their vvay? / The ſprevvſeſt Citie-Lads for her vvould faine the Countrie-aire, / And that their prouder Girles had but adultrate beauties ſvvaire, […]

   1606, William Warner, “The Sixteenth Booke. Chapter CI.”, in A Continuance of Albions England: […], London: […] Felix Kyngston [and Richard Bradock?] for George Potter, […], →OCLC, page 399

   [A] baker's boy in a white apron and blue jumpers went by carrying a basket of bread on his head; and from the nearby tobacconist's, a spruce young lieutenant dressed in a black uniform emerged lighting a cigarette.

   1916, Henry Beston, A Volunteer Poilu

   He had great neatness of person, and he continued to wear his spruce black coat and his bowler hat, always a little too small for him, in a dapper, jaunty manner.

   1919, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, chapter XXXI, in The Moon and Sixpence, [New York, N.Y.]: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers […], →OCLC

   A spruce young lieutenant came over, saluted and clambered into the back of our jeep, and we were off.

   1952, Norman Lewis, Golden Earth

   Synonyms: pulchritudinous

present singular third person spruces · participle present sprucing · participle past spruced · past spruced

1. usuallywith upTo arrange neatly; tidy up.

   Synonyms: prettify, neaten, titivate

2. ambitransitiveusuallywith upTo make oneself spruce (neat and elegant in appearance).
3. To tease.

1. obsoletePrussia.
2. A surname.
3. A number of places in the United States:
   1. An unincorporated community in Caledonia Township, Alcona County, Michigan.
   2. A township in Roseau County, Minnesota, named for spruce trees there.
   3. An unincorporated community in Bates County, Missouri.
   4. A town and unincorporated community therein, in Oconto County, Wisconsin.