Descriptive Writing Task

Examine the objects carefully and choose one. This should be something interesting – it might have a
history to it or a memory attached. It might be complex or beautiful in some way. It might mean
something important to you.

Once you have picked the object, sketch it out using notes. 

 What details do you notice there?
 Think about colour, shape, size, texture, patterns.
 How old or new is it? Has it been changed by humans at any point – maybe it’s broken or worn
down?
 How does it make you think or feel?
 What memories or stories could you attach to it (these can be invented if you don’t have a real
story or memory)?

Write 2 paragraphs describing the object. Try to use as many techniques as possible. Write as quickly
as you can. Each paragraph should be on a different topic. For instance:
 you might choose to structure this as the item now vs it in the past
 physical description vs memory
 or zooming in on different details.

Edit your work.

 Could your descriptions be clearer in any way?
 Is there something you want to add or delete?
 Have you used enough techniques and a good range of different techniques rather than just
repeating the same one?
 Have you used interesting punctuation, a variety of sentence lengths, a range of complex and
specific vocabulary?

This answer is about a candlestick. The paragraphs are structured so that one is about
the physical description of the candlestick, and the other is about its history and how it
might have been made.

A wax cylinder emerges from this candlestick, grey and ghostly – strange implacable colour;
neither brown, nor black, nor white. Its burnt black wick curves slightly to the right,
emerging out of a smoky pool of wax that has softened, melted and solidified again, into a
curve – warped by the concentrated heat of a long snuffed-out flame. The monochromatic
of the candle is directly opposed to the candlestick itself, which is awash with swirling
patterns and colours, hand-painted onto a dark background and finished with a reflective
gloss. Dust, however, has settled over its base and dulled the sheen to a milky pall over the
bright colours below.

Far off, in an ancient land, I can imagine an old woman, sitting at her table in a village
somewhere – perhaps in Siberia, Sweden or Finland. Wrapped in a patterned shawl to
shelter herself from the biting Winter cold, she has only her fingerprints exposed, for
dexterity, and in them, she holds an elegantly small paintbrush. The candlestick has been
carved, turned and polished by her neighbour, and it is her task to transform it from a dull
wooden object into something magical: a work of art. She paints luxurious crimson plums,
bulbous yellow grapes (all perfectly circular) and intricate, swirling foliage that finishes off
the folk art design. She will likely sell this object to a trader for a few pennies, perhaps
enough to afford a measly potato soup for supper. Years later, I will purchase it as a fine
antique in a high-end gallery, in an upmarket quarter of Harrogate, North Yorkshire.

Final Task: Review your work

 Take a look back over your written piece, and do a short analysis of it – you can
either write this out or just think about it.
 How successfully do you think the piece was?
 Are you happy with it?
 Why/why not?

MORE EXAMPLES
"The Blond Guitar"

My most valuable possession is an old, slightly warped blond guitar―the first instrument I
taught myself how to play. It's nothing fancy, just a Madeira folk guitar, all scuffed and scratched
and fingerprinted. At the top is a bramble of copper-wound strings, each one hooked through
the eye of a silver tuning key. The strings are stretched down a long, slim neck, its frets
tarnished, the wood worn by years of fingers pressing chords and picking notes. The body of the
Madeira is shaped like an enormous yellow pear, one that was slightly damaged in shipping. The
blond wood has been chipped and gouged to grey, particularly where the pick guard fell off years
ago. No, it's not a beautiful instrument, but it still lets me make music, and for that I will always
treasure it."

Here, the writer uses a topic sentence to open his paragraph then uses the following sentences to
add specific details. The author creates an image for the mind's eye to travel across by describing
the parts of the guitar in a logical fashion, from the strings on the head to the worn wood on the
body.
He emphasizes its condition by the number of different descriptions of the wear on the guitar,
such as noting its slight warp; distinguishing between scuffs and scratches; describing the effect
that fingers have had on the instrument by wearing down its neck, tarnishing frets, and leaving
prints on the body; listing both its chips and gouges and even noting their effects on the colour
of the instrument. The author even describes the remnants of missing pieces. After all that, he
plainly states his affection for it.

"The Magic Metal Tube”

Once in a long while, four times so far for me, my mother brings out the metal tube that holds
her medical diploma. On the tube are gold circles crossed with seven red lines each―"joy"
ideographs in abstract. There are also little flowers that look like gears for a gold machine.
According to the scraps of labels with Chinese and American addresses, stamps, and postmarks,
the family airmailed the can from Hong Kong in 1950. It got crushed in the middle, and whoever
tried to peel the labels off stopped because the red and gold paint came off too, leaving silver
scratches that rust. Somebody tried to pry the end off before discovering that the tube falls
apart. When I open it, the smell of China flies out, a thousand-year-old bat flying heavy-headed
out of the Chinese caverns where bats are as white as dust, a smell that comes from long ago, far
back in the brain."

Notice how the writer integrates informative and descriptive details in this account of "the metal
tube" that holds her mother's diploma from medical school. She uses colour, shape, texture
(rust, missing paint, pry marks, and scratches), and smell, where she has a particularly strong
metaphor that surprises the reader with its distinctness. The last sentence in the paragraph (not
reproduced here) is more about the smell; closing the paragraph with this aspect adds emphasis
to it. The order of the description is also logical, as the first response to the closed object is how
it looks rather than how it smells when opened.