In this study, we address the ways in which nouns can give rise to new adjectives in Dutch and German. More specifically, the focus is on words with an evaluative meaning that can be used in a wide range of morphological and syntactic constructions in recent (and informal) language use (e.g., German Hammervorstellung ‘very good performance’, hammer film ‘fantastic film’). In the literature, two distinct hypotheses can be found to account for the adjectival uses of such evaluative nouns: the ‘debonding’ hypothesis implies that the intensifying bound morpheme has developed into a free morpheme; the ‘conversion’ hypothesis suggests that the new adjectival uses are the result of a syntactic reanalysis of an N to an A that takes place in the predicative position. As a case study, we analyze the synchronic bound and free uses of Dutch top, and we compare them with German top and spitze. We conclude that the emergence of the adjectival uses of these morphemes imply an interaction between both processes, conversion and debonding.