mirrors

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of mirror.

   The dance studio's walls were covered in floor-to-ceiling mirrors.

   Antique mirrors with gilded frames sold quickly at the auction.

   Note

   A regular plural made with -s, and it carries every sense of the noun: wall and hand mirrors, replica websites kept on other servers, mirror carp, and the historical books advising kings and princes how to behave. The same spelling also serves the present-tense verb, so position settles which you have. After an article, a number or an adjective (two mirrors, antique mirrors), it is the noun.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of mirror.

   The novel's ending mirrors its opening scene almost line for line.

   Each new model closely mirrors the design of the one before it.

   Note

   Here the -s marks agreement, not number. It appears only with a singular subject in the present, as in "the lake mirrors the sky", while plural subjects take bare mirror. Every sense of the verb is transitive, so an object always follows: a pattern, a design, or on the Internet a whole website copied to another server. That following object is the quickest way to tell it from the plural noun.

   The lake mirrors the sky on calm mornings.

   A university server mirrors the project's website.

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