Renovates

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. To restore a building or space, enhancing its aesthetic and functional qualities
2. To make significant repairs and improvements to a building in order to modernize or preserve it
3. The act of updating and renewing a property or structure to enhance its usability and appearance

Etymology: "Renovates" is the third-person singular form of "renovate", so the history belongs to the verb itself. Its earliest use was as an adjective meaning "renewed", which appeared in English around 1440, borrowed from the Latin "renovatus", the past participle of "renovare", meaning "to renew". The verb followed in 1535, so for nearly a century the word described things that had already been made new rather than the act of making them new. The Latin root is built from "re-", meaning "again", and "novare", meaning "to make new", which in turn comes from "novus", "new". The English ending "-ate" is a common verb-forming suffix, which is why the word sounds like a regular verb today. The sense of restoring old buildings, which is the modern meaning, grows directly out of that original idea of making something new again.

Synonyms: restores, revamps, refurbishes

Antonyms: deteriorates