ingenious

Everyday

1. Very clever and inventive, especially at finding new ways to solve problems. tree →
2. (of an idea or machine) Cleverly planned and made. tree →

In the lessons

In design and technology and science, an ingenious invention solves a problem in a new way, like the wheel or Velcro. In the Just So Stories, Taffy and her father Tegumai are ingenious: they invent letters from pictures and sounds. In Alice, the White Knight has many «ingenious» inventions that never work, which is a joke. Phrase: «an ingenious idea».

Examples

• What an ingenious way to fix the bike! tree →
• Tegumai and Taffy found an ingenious way to write sounds. tree →
• The robot was an ingenious invention. tree →
• She built an ingenious trap to catch the sweet thief. tree →
• The escape plan was ingenious. tree →
• Leonardo da Vinci drew many ingenious machines. tree →
• Benfey's suggestion is certainly ingenious, but perhaps too ingenious to be true. tree →

Note

Trap: ingenious (clever) vs ingenuous (innocent, too trusting). The noun of ingenious is ingenuity, not «ingeniousness» (that is rare).