Billow
verb
To swell or puff up, generally related to smoke, fabric, or clouds.
Smoke billowed out of the factory chimney.
Often appears as...
- smoke billows
- clouds billow
noun
A large puff or cloud, typically of smoke, steam, or dust.
The fire produced a billow of smoke.
Often appears as...
- billow of smoke
- billow of dust
verb
To swell or puff up, generally related to smoke, fabric, or clouds.
Smoke billowed out of the factory chimney.
Often appears as...
- smoke billows
- clouds billow
noun
A large puff or cloud, typically of smoke, steam, or dust.
The fire produced a billow of smoke.
Often appears as...
- billow of smoke
- billow of dust
Definition 1 of 2
Pro Tip 1/3Figurative Use
Describes situations that look or feel dramatic, often used metaphorically for emotions.
Excitement billowed within her at the news.
Pro Tip 2/3Physical Movement
Often used to describe how fabric moves in the wind or when someone moves quickly.
Her dress billowed out as she spun around.
Pro Tip 3/3Descriptors Enhancement
Combine 'billow' with words like 'gently' or 'ominously' to enrich the description.
The curtains billowed gently in the breeze.
Pro Tip 1/3Figurative Use
Describes situations that look or feel dramatic, often used metaphorically for emotions.
Excitement billowed within her at the news.
Pro Tip 2/3Physical Movement
Often used to describe how fabric moves in the wind or when someone moves quickly.
Her dress billowed out as she spun around.
Pro Tip 3/3Descriptors Enhancement
Combine 'billow' with words like 'gently' or 'ominously' to enrich the description.
The curtains billowed gently in the breeze.
Pro Tip 1/3Figurative Use
Describes situations that look or feel dramatic, often used metaphorically for emotions.
Excitement billowed within her at the news.
Pro Tip 2/3Physical Movement
Often used to describe how fabric moves in the wind or when someone moves quickly.
Her dress billowed out as she spun around.
Pro Tip 3/3Descriptors Enhancement
Combine 'billow' with words like 'gently' or 'ominously' to enrich the description.
The curtains billowed gently in the breeze.
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Video examples
Frida Kahlo: The woman...
undulating landscapes, transplanted body parts and billowing clouds of demons, Kahlo has often been associated with Surrealism. But while surrealists used dreamlike images to explore the unconscious mind, Kahlo used them to represent her physical body and life experiences. Two of her most-explored experiences
Video examples
The Fascinating Lives of...
You can see that in this male here. First of all he's big and imposing. Male geladas are about twice the size of the females. If you're gonna be fighting all the time, it really helps to be big. And they may look even larger by this billowing cape
Video examples
The myth of Pandora’s...
Filled with terror, Pandora clawed desperately at the air to direct them back into their prison. But the creatures surged out in a gruesome cloud. She felt a wave of foreboding as they billowed away. Zeus had used the box as a vessel
Video examples
Taking imagination...
today I'm using it to create permanent billowing voluptuous forms the scale of hard-edged buildings and cities around the world I was an unlikely person to be doing this I never studied sculpture engineering or architecture in fact
Video examples
Tom Shannon: The painter...
are normally very simplified. I try to refine them down to very simple forms. But the paintings become very complex, because I think the fields that are supporting them, they're billowing, and they're interpenetrating,
Video examples
Janet Echelman: Taking...
I first encountered this ordinary material, fishnet, used the same way for centuries. Today, I'm using it to create permanent, billowing, voluptuous forms the scale of hard-edged buildings in cities around the world.
Video examples
The habits of happiness...
Look at anger itself. It looks very menacing, like a billowing monsoon cloud or thunderstorm. We think we could sit on the cloud, but if you go there, it's just mist. Likewise, if you look at the thought of anger,
Video examples
This ancient rock is...
The black smoke that you see billowing out of these chimneylike structures is also mineral-rich fluid, which is being fed off by bacteria. And since the discovery of these deep-sea vents,
Video examples
Designing for social...
holding my moms like the other reaching out to explore the world her skirt billowing above me it's a comfort I can't describe because it's pre verbal i
Video examples
Marvels of an Arctic...
the fantastical Northern Lights billow and twist all winter above the Brooks Range
Video examples
Frida Kahlo: The woman...
undulating landscapes, transplanted body parts and billowing clouds of demons, Kahlo has often been associated with Surrealism. But while surrealists used dreamlike images to explore the unconscious mind, Kahlo used them to represent her physical body and life experiences. Two of her most-explored experiences
Video examples
The Fascinating Lives of...
You can see that in this male here. First of all he's big and imposing. Male geladas are about twice the size of the females. If you're gonna be fighting all the time, it really helps to be big. And they may look even larger by this billowing cape
Video examples
The myth of Pandora’s...
Filled with terror, Pandora clawed desperately at the air to direct them back into their prison. But the creatures surged out in a gruesome cloud. She felt a wave of foreboding as they billowed away. Zeus had used the box as a vessel
Video examples
Taking imagination...
today I'm using it to create permanent billowing voluptuous forms the scale of hard-edged buildings and cities around the world I was an unlikely person to be doing this I never studied sculpture engineering or architecture in fact
Video examples
Tom Shannon: The painter...
are normally very simplified. I try to refine them down to very simple forms. But the paintings become very complex, because I think the fields that are supporting them, they're billowing, and they're interpenetrating,
Video examples
Janet Echelman: Taking...
I first encountered this ordinary material, fishnet, used the same way for centuries. Today, I'm using it to create permanent, billowing, voluptuous forms the scale of hard-edged buildings in cities around the world.
Video examples
The habits of happiness...
Look at anger itself. It looks very menacing, like a billowing monsoon cloud or thunderstorm. We think we could sit on the cloud, but if you go there, it's just mist. Likewise, if you look at the thought of anger,
Video examples
This ancient rock is...
The black smoke that you see billowing out of these chimneylike structures is also mineral-rich fluid, which is being fed off by bacteria. And since the discovery of these deep-sea vents,
Video examples
Designing for social...
holding my moms like the other reaching out to explore the world her skirt billowing above me it's a comfort I can't describe because it's pre verbal i
Video examples
Marvels of an Arctic...
the fantastical Northern Lights billow and twist all winter above the Brooks Range
Example 1 of 10
Quote examples
P. J. O'Rourke
American Comedian
The idea of a stag hunt evokes chivalry - knights in jerkins and hose, ladies on sidesaddles with wimples and billowing dresses, a white stag symbolizing something-or-other, and Robin Hood getting in the way. An actual stag hunt is more like a horseback meeting of a county planning commission.
Quote examples
John Chrysostom
Clergyman
I know my own soul, how feeble and puny it is: I know the magnitude of this ministry, and the great difficulty of the work; for more stormy billows vex the soul of the priest than the gales which disturb the sea.
Quote examples
Ginger Zee
American Scientist
I loved watching the base of those thunderstorms, the billowing tops of the cumulonimbus, the lightning that effortlessly lit up the lake and the sky. It was gorgeous, so energetic. I was in love.
Quote examples
Benoit Mandelbrot
French Mathematician
A cloud is made of billows upon billows upon billows that look like clouds. As you come closer to a cloud you don't get something smooth, but irregularities at a smaller scale.
Quote examples
Marilyn Monroe
American Actress
Designers want me to dress like Spring, in billowing things. I don't feel like Spring. I feel like a warm red Autumn.
Quote examples
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
German Writer
Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.
Quote examples
P. J. O'Rourke
American Comedian
The idea of a stag hunt evokes chivalry - knights in jerkins and hose, ladies on sidesaddles with wimples and billowing dresses, a white stag symbolizing something-or-other, and Robin Hood getting in the way. An actual stag hunt is more like a horseback meeting of a county planning commission.
Quote examples
John Chrysostom
Clergyman
I know my own soul, how feeble and puny it is: I know the magnitude of this ministry, and the great difficulty of the work; for more stormy billows vex the soul of the priest than the gales which disturb the sea.
Quote examples
Ginger Zee
American Scientist
I loved watching the base of those thunderstorms, the billowing tops of the cumulonimbus, the lightning that effortlessly lit up the lake and the sky. It was gorgeous, so energetic. I was in love.
Quote examples
Benoit Mandelbrot
French Mathematician
A cloud is made of billows upon billows upon billows that look like clouds. As you come closer to a cloud you don't get something smooth, but irregularities at a smaller scale.
Quote examples
Marilyn Monroe
American Actress
Designers want me to dress like Spring, in billowing things. I don't feel like Spring. I feel like a warm red Autumn.
Quote examples
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
German Writer
Character is formed in the stormy billows of the world.
Example 1 of 6
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