If you repurpose something — a machine, a building, a document, even an idea — you use it in a new way, different from the first plan, without changing it very much. An old factory becomes flats. A shipping container becomes a shop. A form written for one job gets used for another. The point is the new use, not a full rebuild. This is a fairly new, practical word, common in business, design, and the news. It sits near reuse and recycle, but they are not the same. Reuse is “use it again as it is, for the same kind of job.” Recycle is “break it down and make it into material again.” Repurpose is “keep the thing, give it a new job.” Though actually, people stretch it: a joke, a hashtag, or a law can be repurposed too.