Descriptive writing calls for close attention to details. Whether your subject is as small as a strawberry or as large as a football stadium, you should begin by observing your subject closely and deciding which details are most significant.
Forty Topic Suggestions: Description
To help you get started, here are 40 topic suggestions for a descriptive paragraph or essay.
- a waiting room
- a basketball, baseball glove, or tennis racket
- a cell phone
- a treasured belonging
- a laptop computer
- a favorite restaurant
- your dream house
- your ideal roommate
- a closet
- your memory of a place that you visited as a child
- a locker
- an accident scene
- a city bus or subway train
- an unusual room
- a child's secret hiding place
- a bowl of fruit
- an item left too long in your refrigerator
- backstage during a play or a concert
- a vase of flowers
- a rest room in a service station
- a street that leads to your home or school
- your favorite food
- the inside of a spaceship
- the scene at a concert or athletic event
- an art exhibit
- an ideal apartment
- your old neighborhood
- a small town cemetery
- a pizza
- a pet
- a photograph
- a hospital emergency room
- a particular friend or family member
- a painting
- a storefront window
- an inspiring view
- a work table
- a character from a book, movie, or television program
- a refrigerator or washing machine
- a Halloween costume
Model Paragraphs and Essays
- Composing Descriptive Paragraphs and Essays
- How to Write a Descriptive Paragraph
- Status Details in Tom Wolfe's Descriptions
- Descriptive Details in Stegner's "Town Dump"
- Joseph Mitchell's Place Description: McSorley's Saloon
- Comparison in Sarah Vowell's Place Description
- "The Kitchen," by Alfred Kazin (with Sentence Combining Exercise #9)
- My Home of Yesteryear (with Sentence Combining Exercise #11)
- "Niagara Falls," by Rupert Brooke
- The Land of Little Rain, by Mary Austin
- "In Mammoth Cave," by John Burroughs
Also see: 400 Writing Topics
