shoebox

noun

shoe·​box ˈshü-ˌbäks How to pronounce shoebox (audio)
variants or less commonly shoe box
1
: a box that shoes are sold in
a shoebox full of old photographs
2
: a small space and especially a small living space
The loft, almost an hour from her house by tube, is a shoebox with 18-foot ceilings, white and blue, with odds and ends of mismatched furniture …Michael Kimmelman
often used before another noun
a shoebox apartment
Since commercial real estate was cheaper, art galleries and Off Off Off Broadway theaters could spring up in shoebox storefronts.James Wolcott

Examples of shoebox in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web His son Orson found the shoebox of 13 tapes, interviews about her life that the Italian German secretly recorded in New York in the 1990s. Marissa Charles, Peoplemag, 2 May 2024 Fifteen foster children had already come through their home when Brittany and Chris Tyler heard about a three-and-a-half pound, two-day-old infant left in a Nike shoebox at a Louisville fire station. Maggie Menderski, The Courier-Journal, 12 Mar. 2024 Notably also in Michigan, a man who lived in the same house as a 6-year-old boy who shot and killed classmate Kayla Rolland in 2000 was charged and pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter for leaving the gun accessible to the child in a shoebox. Gina Kaufman, USA TODAY, 1 Feb. 2024 There wasn't a baby box at 3228 River Park Drive, so Samuel's biological mother wrapped him in a blanket and placed him in a Nike shoebox just at shift change at the fire station. Maggie Menderski, The Courier-Journal, 12 Mar. 2024 In a harrowing essay for The Cut, freelance finance writer Charlotte Cowles details how she was manipulated into putting $50,000 in a shoebox and handing it to a stranger in a white Mercedes on the instructions of someone who claimed to be a CIA agent. Andrew Couts, WIRED, 17 Feb. 2024 The power supply is nice and compact, unlike some docking stations that have power bricks the size of a shoebox. Mark Sparrow, Forbes, 12 Feb. 2024 The news release included a surveillance image of the men walking out of a Nike store in San Jose with their arms full of shoeboxes and other merchandise. Robert Salonga, The Mercury News, 7 Feb. 2024 One is a note from his birth mother, and the other is the blanket in which the days-old baby was swaddled in when he was placed inside a shoebox. Anna Lazarus Caplan, Peoplemag, 9 Feb. 2024

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'shoebox.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

First Known Use

1838, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of shoebox was in 1838

Dictionary Entries Near shoebox

Cite this Entry

“Shoebox.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/shoebox. Accessed 9 May. 2024.

Last Updated: - Updated example sentences
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