Why does “One nice big old round yellow brick house” sound fine, but “one brick nice round yellow old big house” sound weird? Welcome to the hidden rules of English.
- Observation/opinion (“nice”)
- Size (“big”)
- Age (“old”)*
- Shape (“round”)*
- Colour (“yellow”)
- Origin
- Material (“brick”)
- Purpose
*Other authorities flip these two.
Native speakers learn this order but usually cannot articulate it explicitly; if you’re learning English, you have to learn and internalise it as part of learning the language.
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