Scenic vs. Picturesque

having beautiful scenery; picturesque

Example: ‘We have plenty of time: let's take the scenic route.’;

of or relating to scenery

dramatic; theatrical

a depiction of scenery

(informal) a scenic artist; a person employed to design backgrounds for theatre etc.

Of or pertaining to scenery; of the nature of scenery; theatrical.

Example: ‘All these situations communicate a scenical animation to the wild romance, if treated dramatically.’;

used of locations; having beautiful natural scenery;

Example: ‘scenic drives’;

of or relating to the stage or stage scenery;

Example: ‘scenic design’;

Resembling or worthy of a picture or painting; having the qualities of a picture or painting; pleasingly beautiful.

Example: ‘We looked down onto a beautiful, picturesque sunset over the ocean.’;

Forming, or fitted to form, a good or pleasing picture; representing with the clearness or ideal beauty appropriate to a picture; expressing that peculiar kind of beauty which is agreeable in a picture, natural or artificial; graphic; vivid; as, a picturesque scene or attitude; picturesque language.

Example: ‘What is picturesque as placed in relation to the beautiful and the sublime? It is . . . the characteristic pushed into a sensible excess.’;

suggesting or suitable for a picture; pretty as a picture;

Example: ‘a picturesque village’;

strikingly expressive;

Example: ‘a picturesque description of the rainforest’;

Picturesque is an aesthetic ideal introduced into English cultural debate in 1782 by William Gilpin in Observations on the River Wye, and Several Parts of South Wales, etc. Relative Chiefly to Picturesque Beauty; made in the Summer of the Year 1770, a practical book which instructed England’s leisured travellers to examine “the face of a country by the rules of picturesque beauty”.