How to Use ugly duckling in a Sentence

ugly duckling

noun

• The house is an ugly duckling, but it has a lot of potential.
• This is a Bombardier Iltis, an ugly duckling built in Quebec in the mid-1980s.
  — Brendan McAleer, Car and Driver, 2 Oct. 2022
• Man, only in a late-aughts rom-com is Katherine Heigl framed as the ugly duckling.
  — Emma Specter, Vogue, 19 Mar. 2021
• Maybe there is a happy ending in store for this ugly duckling hue, after all.
  — Kelsey Kloss, ELLE Decor, 16 Aug. 2016
• Did his school chums not know about the whole ugly duckling phenomenon?
  — Lauren Le Vine, Redbook, 30 May 2013
• Robinson and Nunn might have been viewed as ugly ducklings during the 2018 NBA draft, but that is ancient history now.
  — Joey Yashinsky, Detroit Free Press, 11 Dec. 2019
• Beethoven’s Fourth is not the ugly duckling of the symphonies so much as the modest, slender person crushed on the subway bench between two massive manspreaders.
  — New York Times, 27 Mar. 2020
• Sandwiched between the capital, Brussels, and the fairytale city of Bruges, Ghent delights in being the underdog, but the city is far from being the ugly duckling of the trio.
  — National Geographic, 14 Nov. 2019
• Back then, Grenache was a bit of an ugly duckling, as most people were drinking bigger, heavier wines, and Grenache is more medium bodied.
  — John Kell, Fortune, 8 Dec. 2019
• By borrowing a few tried and tested tricks, the industry’s ugly ducklings could turn out nicely.
  — Carol Ryan, WSJ, 12 July 2019
• But however avidly the world treated him like an enchanted princess, his mirror showed him an ugly duckling.
  — Gary Indiana, Harper's Magazine, 25 May 2020
• That ugly duckling dirt lot transformed into a swan, with catered charcuterie, carts selling cold beer and festive banners.
  — Nancy Laturno Writer, San Diego Union-Tribune, 27 Dec. 2020
• Consider a few other popular words that were once ugly ducklings.
  — Time, 17 Jan. 2020
• An Australian ballroom dancer makes an ugly duckling his partner and dares in competition to go flamenco.
  — Ed Stockly, Los Angeles Times, 9 Apr. 2021
• Now, like the ugly duckling that became a swan, the nearly $2 trillion crypto market—with all of its warts—seems to be undergoing a glow-up in the eyes of some of the world's most powerful financial institutions.
  — Declan Harty, Fortune, 7 Apr. 2022
• Off-the-rack 996 GT3s were once the underdogs of the track world, but their ugly duckling status later dissipated when their analogue traits became endearing to Porsche hardliners.
  — Basem Wasef, Car and Driver, 15 Dec. 2020
• The medium itself has long been the ugly duckling of American culture, a stealth art form whose secret, swanlike identity (more bird than plane) has been accorded widespread acclaim only in the past few decades.
  — Michael Saler, WSJ, 4 Nov. 2021
• So now, single and dateless, Padgett accepts a challenge to transform the school’s resident ugly duckling into an enviable hunk.
  — Luke Winkie, Vulture, 1 Sep. 2021
• After decades of being treated as the proverbial ugly duckling of the skin-care world, sunscreen seems to be finally getting its due appreciation and attention.
  — Kaitlyn Yarborough, Southern Living, 10 June 2021
• The soaring demand for warehouses, once the ugly duckling of the real estate industry, underscores their pivotal role in a complex global supply chain.
  — New York Times, 16 Mar. 2022
• The swimming pool, spa, contemporary decor (including custom furniture, signature joinery, and bespoke details like fixtures and lighting), and generous interior space turned the ugly duckling into a swan.
  — Julia Zaltzman, Robb Report, 28 July 2021
• For Nikki Glaser, among the comedians featured in the film, her childhood included overwhelming feelings of being an ugly duckling, multiple insecurities, a craving for attention and an eating disorder.
  — Marianne Garvey, CNN, 7 Apr. 2021

Last Updated: 20 Nov 2024