gilding the lily
Overdoing already perfect
Gilding the lily is adding unnecessary ornament to something already beautiful or complete—embellishment that detracts rather than enhances.
The phrase comes from a misremembering of Shakespeare, who wrote "to gild refined gold, to paint the lily." The director kept adding effects until critics accused her of gilding the lily.
Often appears as the verb phrase gild the lily.
- flourishTo grow vigorously
- overkillUnnecessary additional effort
- over the topExcessively theatrical or extreme
- unnecessaryNot essential or required
- excessSurplus beyond need
embellish · adorn · piling on · laying it on thick · overelaborate · redundancy · coals to Newcastle · icing on the cake · superfluity · beautify · exaggerate · ostentation · extraneous · overdo · overdress · dressed to the nines · enhance · gaudy
- deceptionlie, lies, lying, fake, fraud
- bonusesbonus, cash bonus, performance bonus, retention bonus, relocation bonus
- metaphors for overachievementgoing the extra mile, raising the bar, going above and beyond, overdelivering, overperforming
gilding the lilyrestraint
Control over impulses
understatement · less is more · unadorned · no frills · simplicity
gilding the lilyminimalism
Aesthetic of reduction
simplicity · austerity · spareness · essentialism · clean lines
gilding the lilybrevity
Shortness of expression
economy of words · conciseness · terseness · laconicism · cutting to the chase
lily, gild, gilded, gilding, gilt, gilder, ungilded, gilders