back to the drawing board

back to the drawing board

Revising something (such as a plan) from the beginning, typically after it has failed. That ad campaign was not as successful as we had hoped. Back to the drawing board. We need to go back to the drawing board on this project. I think it had some fundamental flaws from the start.

See also: back, board, drawing, to

Farlex Dictionary of Idioms. © 2022 Farlex, Inc, all rights reserved.

back to the drawing board

Fig. time to start from the start; it is time to plan something over again. (Plans or schematics are drawn on a drawing board. Note the variations shown in the examples.) It didn't work. Back to the drawing board. I flunked English this semester. Well, back to the old drawing board.

See also: back, board, drawing, to

McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs. © 2002 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

back to the drawing board

Also, back to square one. Back to the beginning because the current attempt was unsuccessful, as in When the town refused to fund our music program, we had to go back to the drawing board , or I've assembled this wrong side up, so it's back to square one. The first term originated during World War II, most likely from the caption of a cartoon by Peter Arno in The New Yorker magazine. It pictured a man who held a set of blueprints and was watching an airplane explode. The variant is thought to come from a board game or street game where an unlucky throw of dice or a marker sends the player back to the beginning of the course. It was popularized by British sports-casters in the 1930s, when the printed radio program included a grid with numbered squares to help listeners follow the description of a soccer game.

See also: back, board, drawing, to

The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 2003, 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

back to the drawing board

COMMON If you have to go back to the drawing board, something which you have done has not been successful and you will have to try another idea. His government should go back to the drawing board to rethink their programme in time to return it to the Parliament by September. Failing to win means going back to the drawing board, identifying shortcomings and attempting to improve on them. Note: Drawing boards are large flat boards, on which designers or architects place their paper when drawing plans or designs.

See also: back, board, drawing, to

Collins COBUILD Idioms Dictionary, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2012

back to the drawing board

used to indicate that an idea or scheme has been unsuccessful and a new one must be devised.

An architectural or engineering project is at its earliest phase when it exists only as a plan on a drawing board .

1991 Discover Even as Humphries fine-tunes his system, however, he realizes that NASA could send him back to the drawing board.

See also: back, board, drawing, to

Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017

(it’s) back to the ˈdrawing board

a new plan must be prepared because an earlier one has failed: She’s refused to consider our offer, so it’s back to the drawing board, I’m afraid.

See also: back, board, drawing, to

Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017

back to the drawing board

Back to the beginning or the planning stage after an approach has proved unsuccessful.

See also: back, board, drawing, to

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.