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Originally and chiefly American English, the colloquial phrase to put lipstick on a pig, and its variants, mean: to (seek to) make minor or superficial improvements to something considered fundamentally unappealing or inadequate.
This phrase is often extended to but it is still a pig, and variants. The earliest occurrence of the extended form that I have found is from Planning council vote puts Wekiva Falls up a creek, by Lisanne Renner, of the Sentinel staff, published in The Orlando Sentinel (Orlando, Florida, USA) of Thursday 29th September 1988 [page A15, column 5]:
Winter Park—It has been called the blob, a cancer on the landscape, a pig with lipstick. On Wednesday the East Central Florida Regional Planning Council simply called Wekiva Falls a bad idea that should not be built amid the Wekiva River’s wilderness.
[…]
The developer’s plan includes some “meritorious” features designed to protect the environment, said Cliff Guillet, the council’s executive director. […]
But those features don’t compensate for the bigger drawback of putting a large project in a sensitive area, he said. The features are like putting lipstick on a pig, he said. “No matter how well it’s applied, when it’s finished it’s still a pig.”
These are, in chronological order, the earliest occurrences of the phrase to put lipstick on a pig and variants that I have found:
1-: From the Los Angeles Evening Mirror News (Los Angeles, California, USA) of Tuesday 16th June 1959 [page 11, column 1]:
Local Law Can Stop Speeding
Howard Pyle, president of the National Safety Council, suggests a national police force may be necessary to control the rising traffic death toll on the nation’s highways.
Pyle’s concern over the mounting traffic deaths is natural, but any program for federal highway patrol is as impractical as lipstick on a pig.
It would simply add to our already mountainous bureaucracy, without reason.
If the will is there, traffic deaths can be reduced at local and state level, without need for federal traffic controls.
2-: From the column Off The Beat, by D. L. Stewart, published in The Journal Herald (Dayton, Ohio, USA) of Saturday 19th July 1980 [page 4, column 3]:
Detroit: Makeup doesn’t cover ugly mug
DETROIT—OK, so maybe it was like putting lipstick on a pig.
But, for one week at least, Detroit whipped out its cosmetics and managed to make itself look almost pretty.
Not beautiful, mind you. Nearly 300 years of homeliness is not rubbed out by planting a few shrubs and flowers in the downtown area.
If they held a dance for cities, Detroit still would be the one sitting in a chair against the wall, wearing a babushka and white ankle socks.
3-: From First Ward Debate Focuses On Financing, by Jim Morrill, Observer staff writer, published in The Charlotte Observer (Charlotte, North Carolina, USA) of Thursday 18th August 1983 [page 6A, column 3]:
When Boston consultant Dennis Frenchman presented his report on the renewal of Charlotte’s First Ward in January, neighborhood residents, city officials and developers greeted it with enthusiasm.
[…]
Frenchman proposes spending $764,000 to renovate Earle Village. Council member Selden describes the proposals as “window-dressing” and likens them to “putting lipstick on a pig.”
4-: From Leaks in the roof, by Dave Newhouse, published in The Tribune (Oakland, California, USA) of Friday 15th February 1985 [page F1, column 1]:
Putting a dome on Candlestick Park would be like putting lipstick on a pig.
Not my line, drat it. Radio commentator Ron Lyons said it a month ago. And he is so right.
A dome for Candlestick? There are more practical improvements for Candlestick, like cutting it loose and pushing it out to sea as the world’s largest natural-turfed barge.
Float it, yes. Roof it, no.
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