1The process of removing impurities or unwanted elements from a substance.

1. 1.1 The improvement or clarification of something by the making of small changes.
   this gross figure needs considerable refinement

   count noun recent refinements to production techniques

   Example sentencesExamples

   • The concept of validity has been contested and is subject to further refinement.
   • Once this is created, Joint Forces Command and the services can undertake the actual process of concept development, testing, and refinement.
   • Two refinements I would like to see are an improved, wider trigger bar, and a somewhat longer stem.
   • Autocrats hear dissent and critique as threat - they don't understand that it's an open society's process of repair and refinement.
   • By this time his work had become repetitive and obsessed with technical refinement.
   • The second generation Mondeo brought fresh, less rounded looks, along with many technical refinements.
   • So no matter how different the media or formats you use, all of the work reflects a highly calibrated process of editing and refinement.
   • However, he believes that the ongoing refinement of automated manufacturing processes promises to make them cost-competitive in the near future.
   • In fact, the original policy can be improved as the organization undergoes an iterative process of interpretation, conflict, and refinement.
   • We accept this sort of refinement during a creative process like design, not as part of a manufacturing process.
   • Why is it that when the evolution of man is picturised, humans are the ultimate in the process of evolutionary refinement?
   • A further refinement is to establish a standardized numbering system to label all structures in contested areas.
   • Researchers have conducted testing and product development on a laboratory scale and are looking for an industrial partner for scale-up and further refinement of the process.
   • Thornton's basic typology remains persuasive, though later writers have added further refinements.
   • His refinement of this balance theoretic process produces perhaps the most thoroughly developed analysis of cohesion within contemporary network analysis.
   • Formula One became an intriguing sport not because of what it could do for the car industry and the latest refinement of the family saloon.
   • Dr Penkman added: ‘This process is a refinement of a relatively old method first used in the 1960s.’
   • Sharing the results with other faculty led to further refinements to this summative approach.
   • Hagel and Brown point out that construction of the Web services architecture is still in its early stages and will require years of investment and refinement.
   • Such investigations may lead to further refinements in U.S. building codes.

   Synonyms

   improvement, perfection, polishing, honing, fine-tuning, touching up, revision, editing, copy-editing

   completion, finishing, finishing off, the final/finishing touches, crowning, consummation

   informal tweaking
2. 1.2 Cultured elegance in behaviour or manner.
   her carefully cultivated veneer of refinement

   Example sentencesExamples

   • These are people of refinement, they have manners and tact and I'm sure they're all expecting the same of you.
   • Of course, calling Descartes the first nerd grossly ignores his personal refinement, elegant prose style, sly wit, even his surprising career as a soldier of fortune.
   • Generally, the more educated a man, the greater his self-control and refinement in dealing with the fair sex.
   • Designers at Chrysler exhibited elegance and refinement with the Firepower Grand Tourer Concept.
   • Grace, refinement, and good breeding are usually apparent with this aspect.
   • We are so covered with layers and layers of refinement, of social polish, of airs and graces and civilization and pretensions that the human in us almost ceases to exist.
   • Did I say that Crouch lacks finesse and refinement?
   • When I think of Jenny a myriad of words come to mind; beauty, depth, elegance, refinement, talent, charm, sensuality, intellect… and these are just the first that come to mind!
   • In many western societies, an idealized femininity is often identified with refinement, and refinement in turn with the dominant language.
   • When exactly did this downward cultural spiral begin, this loss of tact and refinement and understanding that some things should not be said or directly represented?
   • Mere culture, refinement, respectability, morality, is simply a painted coating of varnish on the outside.
   • It amused Kemp that old man Colter had sent his daughter away for refinement and culture, then brought her back to one of the roughest, most uncivilized places in the country.
   • His dignity and refinement and focus and calm manner add up to a state of grace worthy of a man.
   • From a range of proposals, the project created by the Peugeot Style Centre was chosen, due to its fluid lines that give the car a powerful look, refinement and elegance.
   • ‘I think my mother wanted to instill some grace and refinement in me,’ recalls Ansanelli.
   • This place was a vacation from the discriminating world, a place where culture and refinement took a step down to allow raw emotion to pass.
   • Here, it's tempered somewhat by the movie's setting in the Depression-era South, and that many characters are particularly lacking in education or cultural refinement.
   • To be a Nawab is to be heir to a lifestyle marked by refinement in speech and behaviour.
   • Mind you, how could a woman of such refinement and grace be expected to slop out or even be put into daily contact with all those other real criminals in Mountjoy?
   • Association with the Tuesday Club offered an opportunity to acquire some of that old world patina of gentility and refinement so desired by the Chesapeake elite.

   Synonyms

   style, elegance, finesse, polish, finish, sophistication, urbanity

   civility, politeness, grace, graciousness, courtliness, good manners, good breeding, gentility

   cultivation, culture, taste, discrimination

   humorous couth

   French politesse
3. 1.3 Sophisticated and superior good taste.
   the refinement of Hellenistic art

   Example sentencesExamples

   • It's a bit tacky, especially in comparison to the sophistication and refinement of the historic section.
   • You're buying into a lifestyle that shrieks taste and refinement.
   • It has created a sense of subtle refinement that lots of London bars lack.
   • My own feeling is that Englishmen of taste and refinement prefer the longer word, but, sadly, American influence has meant that it is now falling out of use.
   • As you would expect from a man of Roye's taste and refinement, the pictures are really rather beautiful.
   • This is what people come to Granada to see and no amount of description can do justice to its refinement and subtlety, precisely because the essence of Moorish art is its simplicity.
   • Materials such as raw concrete, glass and wood are used with characteristic economy and refinement.
   • Taken overall, his nine features display a degree of visual refinement and intellectual ambition unusual in a director attached to the mainstream British film industry.
   • His mature works combine features of his Bruges predecessors, van Eyck's fascination with the detail of the visible world and Memling's refinement, with some compositional elements from Hugo van der Goes.
   • Uncluttered and spacious, the overall design suggests modern refinement and glamour rather than stuffy tradition.
   • He seeks in this way to place himself in cultivated society and to impress his guests, his family - perhaps even himself - with his own refinement and sophistication.
   • The flowery schemes shouldn't work, but they do (the line between bad taste and refinement can be a fine one).
   • However, American cities of the nineteenth century were seen as bastions of culture and refinement.
   • Although undeniably proud of their newly won political independence, the former colonials still aspired to many of the European cultural and material standards of refinement and civility.
   • The expense of imported goods would surely have signaled a market for any local entrepreneur who was prepared to seize the opportunity and produce objects of similar refinement and style.
   • In Urban India today, it has become a symbol of culture and refinement to talk about and to support environmental causes.
   • Dressed that night in an elegant ruby satin, Randolph Duke dress and a dripping diamond necklace, Harden exuded an old-time glamour and refinement that's rarely seen nowadays.
   • Everything was sculpted to present an elegant, Japanese refinement, using dark woods and red silks and gold embroidery and edging.
   • Proenza Schouler produced tailored garments that showed refinement and elegance in their graceful design.
   • For those cowed by all this ardent muscularity, turn to her to discover, at the last, a private Rubens, that man of exceptional refinement and sensitivity.

   Synonyms

   judgement, taste, discrimination, cultivation, sophistication, enlightenment, sensitivity, subtlety