This work reports a facile method to fabricate gold coated copper(II) hydroxide pine-needle-like micro/nanostructures for surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) application. The effects of reaction parameters on the shape, size and surface morphology of the products are systematically investigated. The as-prepared 3D hierarchical structures have the advantage of a large surface area available for the formation of hot spots and the adsorption of target analytes, thus dramatically improving the Raman signals. The finite difference time domain calculations indicate that the pine-needle-like model pattern may demonstrate a high quality SERS property owing to the high density and abundant hot spot characteristic in closely spaced needle-like arms. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.