From scratch means from the very beginning, with nothing ready-made: we built the booking system from scratch. With food, it means made from raw ingredients: he makes pastry from scratch instead of buying it. Scratch here isn't a mark on a screen; it's an old word for the starting line of a race.
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start / build / make / create something from scratch
- We built the booking system from scratch.
- My grandfather makes the pastry from scratch every Sunday.
- The corrupted file meant that I had to recreate the diagram from scratch.
What changed
First versionThey designed the training programme from the scratch.
RevisionThey designed the training programme from scratch.
From the beginning and from the start both have the, so from the scratch looks right. But from scratch never takes an article. Without the, the programme was designed from scratch.
Start over means begin again after a failed attempt: the file crashed, so I started over. From scratch means from an empty start, the first time or again: build a house from scratch. If you only fixed the old version, it's not from scratch.
Your turn
We used no existing template: We created the layout from ___.
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scratch — The phrase ends in scratch, which doesn't change. Scratches just means marks on a surface.
Describe something you made with no ready-made base: a dish, a website, a piece of furniture. Use from scratch.
We made the board game from scratch, including drawing every card.
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