Try to write

looks like a house on top of a different house

> I can't write about women because I don't know the first thing about psychosis

> I can't write about opie because I don't know the first thing about autism

> I can't describe black folks becuase I don't know the first thing about primatology

A two-story house. Its archaic look is created by an arc before the door and vines on the bare bricks of the ground floor. The other floor is white, but striped with black planks.

Wow, that was difficult. And you don't even have to do all this shit, just saying "a two-story house" is perfectly enough if you're not Tolstoy or Balzac.

...

Whoa no windows

ITT: OP realizes he simply cant write

Must you describe the house? You can expend your energy on instead focusing on characters or plot. Many writers are pretty slim on environmental descriptions but they make up for it on other things.

underfuckingrated

In Double Indemnity, Chandler describes a house as having been built "cock-eyed." Grow an imagination, people.

The reader is supposed to fill in the blanks. Detailed description is only necessary if you need the subject to be absolutely clear and when the reader's unique sense of imagination could fuck up the things you want to convey.

Congrats you have a shitty imagination.

Am I the only one who barely pays attention to descriptions of buildings? They're usually boring as fuck

Get some reference then. What do you think a draftsman, someone who is much more in need to describe something accurately going to do? Do you think every good draftsman is well educated in all kind of sciences? No, they just get reference. The more reference the more freedom you gain describing the things you want to describe.

There is also never a need to be completely accurate as it would become very static to read. You know, the way an actual expert would write is to be very specific without any need to have a certain flow in the writing. A writer is the opposite way, writing texts to be lively and artistic.

Are you autistic?

How about you just write what you know instead of trying to write what you don't know? If you obsess over research you'll never write anything.

Research. It takes a long time and that's why writing is a job not a hobby.

Hey, that guy didn't say anything about a smiling sun

Time is literally of no relevance to determine what is job and what is hobby.

amen, brother

The house looked old, but not too old. Its a sort of blend of the 1800s and the 1950s. It had a European look with large windows on both floors. It's moderately large, with the bottom half being brick, and the top half being wooden, with black vertical planks. Two trees stand by the entryway, which is covered to form a tiny tiny porch, just barely large enough for two men to have a conversation on. A chimney protrudes from the top, although from the look of it, it's not used anymore.

The point is it doesn't actually matter exactly what the house looks like unless that's the actual setting of your story. If it's a place only visited once just briefly describe it and let the readers imagination fill it in, like many others have suggested here.

>mixing tenses

I bet you thought Invisible Cities was shit.

The house was very very interesting and unique looking, I think it was an old house in a different country.

If you want your reader to know that you're an uncultivated american.

Morelike Invisible Shitties, am I right?

Never said I was a good writer. I spent maybe 45 seconds on that description and I'm typing from a smartphone at work. Cut me a break, or dont, I don't care. But yeah mixing tenses is extremely amature I agree.

Why do you feel like you have to be as descriptive as possible.

The house looked like the architect mixed-and-matched two seperate, different buildings and smashed them into one entity. It was peppered with windows, looking good individually, but giving off an uncanny feeling once zoomed out of the picture. The design of the house did little to diminish this effect. The upper-half had the look of a zebra, thick black lines running from the top to the middle, immediately transitioning into a rustic shade of red which took dominance over the lower-half of the building. The door was hidden beneath a large archway, a reclusive nature contrasting with the bombastic architecture of the house.

Are you serious, my boy?

What did you dislike about it?

Thats why i love Dostoiesvski and Charles Bukowski, they dont waste much time with descriptions of objects and places.

But the ones who hve the knowledge (or the need) to do it like Tolstoy and Victor Hugo who takes description to a whole new level.

Including both "separate" and "different" is redundant. "Looking good individually" and everything that follows in that sentence is awkward. Don't talk about zooming out -- are you describing the house or a picture of the house on your computer? Get rid of "shade of," replace "took dominance" with dominated. Not sure you know what "bombastic" means.

>not using a synonym for house to point into the direction that it's an unusual non-generic house
>mentioning that the house has a lot of windows but not pointing out that almost every window has a different size
>not even mentioning the big ass eye catcher living room window that grows out of the wall
>smashed
>bombastic

You retards know that this is a completely typical Victorian house right? From red brick to bay windows to timber framing, it's literally a textbook example. You literally don't have to say anything else.

>try to write people
>realize I can't write people because I'm fundamentally afraid of social contact

>an unusual non-generic house
It's literally a literally generic Victorian house.

You moved to the realms of context. Depending on the setting the house might be highly unusual or not even worth mentioning.

Nah man don't fool yourself
You love them because you're a pleb and don't know how to read

Unless it's literally on Mars, there's literally hundreds of them wherever this one is located.

Since it's fiction it can be literally in a million unusual places.

Try writing about what you feel, rather than what you know.

It doesn't mean it has to have a detailed unique description since Earthlings know what Victorian architecture looks like (unless they're from America where they literally don't have history).

Thanks guys, I do realize a problem with my writing in general is I tend to overload on the flavorful language, even if its unnecessary.

the whole point of the thread is how do you describe a Victorian house if you don't know that it's a Victorian house.

And it's an Edwardian house.

It was implied

Edwardian is a subset of Victorian, architecturally speaking (not literally).

you know what buildings, trees and people look like. just describe them as you see them and then work from there.

you can find all those things by sending half an hour on wikipedia

Joyce needed vast amount of knowledge for his latter works

just Cormac McCarthy it and say "house" and give the name of the town. let the reader do the work

>want to write about love
>be literal 25 year old virgin

I was only once in love in grade school.

It looks like the kind of house you would imagine swiss boarding school girls living in. It's like German, but comfier.

Nobody cares about your autistic detailed descriptions, OP. Specially because your writing is shit.

What if the narrator is an uncultivated American? I mean, the only reason someone would give such a detailed description of a house is becuase the narrator is autistic, like OP.

>his reason for loving an author is because they half ass their writing and his inferior intellect can understand it
You are really mediocre.

when you're describing something, you're merely describing your reaction/interpretation of it, even if you think you aren't. you don't need a PhD to describe a forest. look inside yourself. how does the forest make you feel? what about the forest makes you feel that way? combine these two things: bam, quality description (inventive/creative prose doesn't hurt ofc)

writing with that mindset would create unique characters from your perspective due to how you percieve them

I feel that. Writing already makes me feel so vulnerable.

>striped

It's half timbered damn haha

It was the house in which they routinely found dead grandmas.

a mature in deed

Same. Alhough I can read but I cant think.

In my many trips to the zoo, I never imagined this: a zebra mounting a red panda of equivalent breadth and not-dissimilar height--an 'exterior wildness' Father requested the architect design; with abundant shrubbery to give the 'botanical feel' Mother requested the landscaper provide--with plentiful windows so that the children within may see the land their eldest --or most-favourable-- may eventually inherit without ever stepping foot outside of their womb.

This is very rough, but you get the point.

Superficial information about the house's physical appearance is given, and the mood is given alongside character information.

What the house precisely looks like is irrelevant, instead WHY the house is the way it is, is what adds richness to the novel. I describe the resident's banality, wealth, and situation; as well as provide a beginning to the paragraph that at least provides an image of how tacky the house is.

The house was stunning, even beautiful. The sky above it hung blindingly white above the roof. It was a really nice house; my grandfather died in it. It was for that reason that I called him: Icevein.

Time isn't real.

Let's start with a question: Do you want to write, or do you want to say you have written?

There's a big difference, and that difference comes up more often than you might think.

Writers write. Poseurs want to say they've written something.

If you want to write, then do it. If you want to think of excuses about why you can't write, maybe you'd be better off playing video games.

I don't have a sociology degree but I can still tell that you're a gigantic fucking faggot

dude this is the fun part... yes, in order to be a director or a writer you need to know every single detail of the world you are describing. learn! research is fucking cool. its like customization.

love's overrated desu

i cant learn
i just forget everything
except memes
JUST

There are no houses like that where I live and I live in Europe.

Disregard this, I didn't read the whole post.

It took like fifty posts to get to this, the correct answer. God, this board.

I fucking hate writers that talk about the kinds of trees and plants.
It's like, who the fuck cares? I don't even know what any of that stuff is. Just say tree.

The offensive absolute whiteness of its upper story looked as though it might dissipate under the binding influence of its ramifying black gridwork. The lower story supported this atrocity with as much reserved dignity as could be expected.

Interesting writing excercise

I WILL NEVER MAKE IT

>implying a smug sun was not assumed by the readers contempt for the weak description

>i never said I was a good writer
>challenge was to describe a building without the use of architectural jargon as it might occur in a publishable work

WOW

This. Even if you avoid using architectural terminology you can still look like an idiot acting like the house was exceptional in some way

Its the best description in the thread so far. Not great but at least its something.

not OP but I get the suspsicion I have covert poseur tendencies. Sometimes I look at my journal entries and it seems like I just get carried away with doing something impressive and that I have no real authentic inner dialogue that isn't entirely prosaic.

The house was a quaint two story European cottage. It almost looked as if the top story was built upon the older foundation of the first floor, which was tinging with age. Slightly unkempt shrubbery laid around the steps leading to an arch, which preceded the front door. Vines slithered their way up parts of the building, giving it almost an ominous feeling.

this.
and this.

Entertaining writing should give the reader freedom to partially construct and interpret the world you made, unless you're writing textbooks, law, cookbooks, non-allegorical philosophy, things need literal, thorough, and stringent definition. Go back to reading mango and muh comics if you can't use your imagination or do exercises to increase your imagination if you're unsatisfied.

see like here you look like a retard for not understanding what Edwardian tudor revival architecture looks like. There are n shortcuts faggots.

I will kick your shit in you fucking aspie!

Don't worry about it user, you were clearly just showing how such a description would work. You made sense.

Absolutely. A lot of anons in this thread don't seem to realise that their weaknesses can become strengths. These things aren't necessarily weaknesses, they're unique aspects and views that can strengthen your work. Someone being an optimist doesn't mean their writing will "suffer from a lack of pessimism", it just means that their worldview will inform their writing. Don't fight it, use it.

Surely I'm not the only writer here that just flat-out doesn't describe stuff like this. The interesting thing in stories for me are the characters, emotions, theme, and story. None of that requires intense detailed description of physical elements. How the house specifically looks isn't as important as what it means to the protagonist, or how it makes them feel. Depends on your style of writing though, of course - Robert Jordan would spend a page describing the house, Martin a paragraph, Sanderson maybe a sentence.

>posts random nondescript picture of a boy

Is that you Art Admirer?