Meaning & use
adorning
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“adorning” is a form of “adorn”. See that entry for the full set of meanings.
Meanings
verbtransitive
Making a person or place look more attractive by adding decorations, ornaments or something beautiful.
Grammar: Takes an object: flowers were adorning the table.
Patterns
- adorn something with something
- adorn someone with something
Paper lanterns were adorning the garden for the wedding reception.
She walked in wearing a silver necklace adorning her neck.
Murals adorning the school hallway were painted by the students.
adjectivebefore a nounliterary
Used of something that is placed on or around a thing as decoration.
Grammar: Comes before a noun and describes the decoration: the adorning ribbons.
The adorning vines gave the old gate a romantic look.
He admired the adorning carvings along the cathedral door.
Word forms
| base form | adorn |
|---|---|
| third person singular | adorns |
| past tense | adorned |
| -ing form | adorning |
Common combinations
- adorning the walls
- Family photos were adorning the walls of the hallway.
- adorning her hair
- A bright flower adorning her hair caught everyone's eye.
- adorning the cover
- The painting adorning the cover is by a local artist.
- adorning the tree
- Children took turns adorning the tree with lights.
- beautifully adorning
- Lace beautifully adorning the collar made the dress special.
Synonyms and how they differ
- decorating
- Decorating is the plain everyday word, while adorning sounds more elegant and stresses beauty rather than the act of arranging things.
- embellishing
- Embellishing suggests adding extra details to improve something that already exists, and it is also used for stories.
- ornamenting
- Ornamenting is rarer and focuses on adding ornaments, whereas adorning can describe any attractive addition.
- garnishing
- Garnishing is used almost only for food, so it would not fit a wall or a person.
Opposites
Word family
Commonly confused: adorning or adoring? adorning or abhorring?
adorning vs adoring
Adoring means loving someone deeply, as in an adoring fan. Adorning means decorating; the two differ by one letter.
adorning vs abhorring
Abhorring means hating strongly and has nothing to do with decoration.
Practice
Which sentence uses adorning correctly?
Choose one answer.
Adorning means decorating, so ivy on a wall fits. Option 0 and 3 confuse it with adoring (loving), and option 2 does not make grammatical sense.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “adorning”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.