Other forms: renovated, renovating
To renovate is to repair and modernise an old building. Renovate the kitchen, fully renovated, renovate a cottage.
It keeps the building and brings it up to date, which is what separates it from restoration, where the point is to put things back as they were. In a listed building the difference is legal as well as aesthetic, and the wrong choice is an offence.
1verbrenovateTo repair and modernise an old building.
“They bought an old farmhouse and spent two years renovating it.”
renovate is a repairing.
Latin renovare means to make new again — re, again, plus novus, new.
Proto-Indo-European
*new- (new)
Latin
renovātus
Middle English
renovat — renewed
English, today
renovate
Built from
The adjective 1440, the verb in 1535; from Middle English renovat (“renewed”), from Latin renovātus, perfect passive participle of renovō (“to renew”), see -ate. Participial usage up until Early Modern English.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA