Combining describers and classifiers

In the previous snippet, describers and classifiers were in separate adjective groups:

Snotlout was good at everything and a natural leader. Dogsbreath was as tall as his father and could do amusing things like farting to the tune of the Berk national anthem.

How to Train Your Dragon(2003)

But we often combine describers and classifiers within the same adjective group.

Here's a snippet we saw earlier that does this:

And it wasn't simply an ordinary enormous chocolate factory, either.

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory(1964)

If you read the expandable section about commas on the Tremendous, marvellous place page earlier, now you know why that second comma didn't quite make sense—because in this sentence 'chocolate' is meant as a classifier, but the comma somehow turns it into a describer!

Let's have a look at a few more examples. In each snippet below, which words do you think are describers and classifiers?

He put his headset on and glanced at the time readout on the giant center screen at the front of the room.

The Martian(2014)

The Cafe Antalya was a quiet and old-fashioned place, with starched white tablecloths and dark wood panelling.

The Secret Commonwealth(2019)

'Old-fashioned' is interesting.

In this context, old-fashioned is definitely a describer because the 'and' wouldn't make sense if old-fashioned were meant as a classifier. Compare these:

A quiet and old-fashioned place... (makes sense)

A quiet and police place... (doesn't quite make sense)

A quiet and French place... (doesn't quite make sense)

But if the intention was to classify things by their date or style, then old-fashioned could become a classifier, you just wouldn't use 'and'. For example:

A quiet old-fashioned place...

A quiet modern place...

The key difference here is that describers represent subjective opinions, whereas classifiers represent objective categories.

'Old-fashioned' could be either: it could be a subjective opinion or it could be a categorical classification.

But in this snippet, it works as an opinion.

Notice that whenever describers and classifiers are used in the same adjective group, the classifiers always come last. (If you're a native English speaker, you will do this without even noticing it.)

Now have a go at writing your own snippet. If you like, you can use this image as inspiration.

In the hall of a museum, a humanoid being reaches out of a painting to offer a girl a flower.

Tip: find interesting classifiers by googling different types of flowers and art styles.

Write your own snippet using a combination of describers and classifiers.

Adjective groups

Combining describers and classifiers