Adjectives that paint a picture

By Michael Ukwuma

How to describe people, places and things vividly: strong adjectives, the right order, comparisons and intensifiers.

Description is a big part of CELPIP. Speaking Task 3 asks you to describe a scene. Task 8 asks you to describe something unusual. Your emails need detail. Adjectives are your paintbrush. Most people only use three colours: good, nice and big. Let's add more.

Swap weak adjectives for strong ones

good: helpful, reliable, excellent, practical, convenient, affordable
bad: disappointing, frustrating, unreliable, inconvenient, harmful
nice: pleasant, welcoming, cozy, friendly, peaceful, charming
big: spacious, enormous, crowded, wide, generous
small: tiny, compact, narrow, limited, modest
happy: delighted, relieved, cheerful, excited, grateful
sad: disappointed, upset, worried, frustrated, heartbroken
busy: crowded, hectic, lively, packed, bustling

Precision first. Pick the adjective that is precise, not the one that sounds clever. 'A spacious kitchen' is precise. 'A gargantuan kitchen' sounds strange.

Order when you use more than one

English has a natural order. You rarely need more than two or three adjectives, but when you do, follow it: opinion, size, age, shape, colour, origin, material, purpose, then the noun.

Natural order
a lovely old wooden table
a small round red ball
a beautiful new Canadian winter coat

Say 'a lovely old table', never 'an old lovely table'. Native speakers feel the order even if they cannot explain it.

Comparing things

Short adjectives: cheap, cheaper, the cheapest. Big, bigger, the biggest.
Long adjectives: more convenient, the most convenient.
Irregular: good, better, the best. Bad, worse, the worst. Far, farther, the farthest.
Equal: as quiet as, not as expensive as.
Much and far make a comparison stronger: much cheaper, far more convenient.

Task 5 example
The downtown apartment is much more convenient, but the one near the lake is far quieter and about two hundred dollars cheaper.

Intensifiers and softeners

Add strength or soften gently: very, quite, rather, extremely, fairly, a little, a bit, slightly, incredibly.

Balanced description
The service was slightly slow, but the staff were incredibly friendly.

Avoid stacking: 'very very big' sounds weak. Change the adjective instead: enormous.

Adjectives ending in ed and ing

Ed describes how a person feels. Ing describes what causes the feeling.

Do not mix them
I was bored. The meeting was boring.
The children were excited. The trip was exciting.
She felt confused. The instructions were confusing.

Key points

Replace good, bad and nice with precise words.
Opinion, size, age, shape, colour, origin, material, purpose.
Much and far strengthen comparisons.
Ed for feelings, ing for causes.