Order of the Adjectives

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When multiple adjectives are used to describe a noun, the adjectives usually appear in a certain order before the noun they modify. The list below is a guide, however, there may be exceptions.

1. Articles, Quantifiers or Other Noun Markers

a, an, the, his, some, several, Henry's...

2. What We Think

beautiful, honest, tasty, appealing, gorgeous...

3. Size

tall, small, little, big, large, huge...

4. Age

new, old, young...

5. Shape

slim, round, square...

6. Color

White, purple, blue, yellow...

7. Nationality

English, Canadian, American...

8. Religion

Catholic, Protestant, Muslim, Jewish

9. Material

cotton, plastic, steel, woolen...

10. Purpose

dining (table), reading (exercise), scratch (book)...

11. The Noun

pen, summer, teacher, book, child...

Examples:

Look. It is a lovely small wooden house.
Where is your beautiful tall young sister?
I want that expensive Swiss watch.
It is a wonderful small, old, round, wooden coffee table.
There is a pair of nice, white, leather, walking trainers.

When a noun is not used, the position of AND and BUT is important.

Raymond is tall and thin.
New York is big, noisy and crowded.
She is intelligent but lazy.
The house is nice but dirty. ↑▲▲▲▲▲▲▲↑