How to Use ashen in a Sentence

ashen

adjective
  • Its skin looked yellow, and sometimes ashen.
    — Literary Hub, 16 Oct. 2025
  • This hadn’t mattered for some time, because the creek was dry, the creek was ashen.
    — Literary Hub, 18 Nov. 2025
  • Put it in the same cosmic drawer as the ashen light of Venus.
    — Jamie Carter, Forbes, 11 Oct. 2021
  • Though ashen, the convex steel form still resonates to the rhythmic thump of her hands.
    — Matthew Carey, Deadline, 7 Jan. 2026
  • But on one of our last days, the ashen sky cracked open to reveal fragments of a cerulean canvas.
    — Celeste Moure, Condé Nast Traveler, 16 Feb. 2024
  • Their chicks, born a few months ago, are getting tall yet remain in their nascent plumage of ashen gray feathers.
    — Nick Remsen, Vogue, 21 Dec. 2022
  • Always, always those little ashen faces.
    — Literary Hub, 29 May 2026
  • As the trial got underway, her clients sat ashen at the defense table.
    — J. David Goodman, New York Times, 9 Feb. 2025
  • An ashen corpse drops to the ground, and the dictator moves on with ease, ready to discuss war tactics with his men.
    — Selome Hailu, Variety, 23 Feb. 2024
  • Hitchcock didn’t respond, his face slowly turning ashen.
    — Jeffrey Collins, Sun Sentinel, 30 Apr. 2026
  • Metal railings or a charred brick chimney were all that remained to distinguish the ashen piles.
    — Connor Sheets, Los Angeles Times, 9 Jan. 2025
  • When the world is an ashen wasteland, there’s a good chance naked mole rats will still be around to keep the cockroaches company.
    — Carl Engelking, Discover Magazine, 29 Jan. 2018
  • Perhaps the warmest shade of ash brown in the bunch, this ashen chestnut looks insanely flattering on warm-toned skin types.
    — Kaitlyn Yarborough, Southern Living, 7 Mar. 2024
  • The cruelest consolation for an innocent life made ashen before her time.
    — Andy Andersen, Vulture, 3 Nov. 2024
  • Patches of skin that appear red, white, blue, gray, yellow, purple, brown or ashen as opposed to their normal color.
    — Marina Johnson, Louisville Courier Journal, 22 Jan. 2026
  • The darkened mood of the book never lifts as a father and son shuffle across the ashen landscape, with little hope of finding a place left untouched.
    — Steve Marble, Los Angeles Times, 13 June 2023
  • People with darker complexions may take on an ashen or blue color, while people with lighter skin often turn red, Smith said.
    — Jake Sheridan, Chicago Tribune, 3 Sep. 2022
  • In addition, the extra light can overwhelm the natural warmth of the Black skin and produce an ashen effect.
    — Globe Staff, BostonGlobe.com, 25 Nov. 2021
  • The venerable monk was draped in his maroon and saffron robe, his bare feet looking ashen with dust, a few of his toes still blackened from his arduous walk.
    — Sarah Hepola, Dallas Morning News, 27 Feb. 2026
  • Now, however, visiting is discouraged as ashen rubble remains, and residents are wary of land grabs by outsiders.
    — Sarah Matusek, The Christian Science Monitor, 29 Aug. 2023
  • Much of the centuries-old town of Lahaina looked like an ashen wasteland in the wake of the wildfire that has destroyed thousands of buildings and sent thousands of residents fleeing for their lives.
    — Stephen Sorace, Fox News, 13 Aug. 2023
  • The economic and cultural heart of the island was reduced to an ashen landscape in the deadliest US wildfire in more than 100 years.
    — Ray Sanchez, CNN, 19 Aug. 2023
  • But before rebuilding can begin and before that fuller history can be fashioned, priceless pieces of Lahaina’s history that survived the fire must be saved from the ashen landscape.
    — Tim Arango, New York Times, 20 Oct. 2023
  • Natalia Rudenko arrives at the office on an ashen February morning with her young son, Egor, to share an account of wartime terror spanning three generations.
    — Martin Kuz, The Christian Science Monitor, 12 Apr. 2023
  • Warm, ashen, and almost preternaturally glossy, consider the pop star's interpretation a blueprint for the mutable color trend.
    — Calin Van Paris, InStyle, 3 Mar. 2026
  • Residents and reporters who visited Lahaina last week discovered the treasured town, home to cultural and religious sites that date back centuries, had turned into an ashen wasteland.
    — USA TODAY, 13 Aug. 2023
  • Much of the hike is spent on a snaking trail that crosses through an ashen landscape, the contours of the land shaped by the devastating avalanche of pumice, ash and steaming gases that exploded from the north side of the volcano in 1980.
    — oregonlive, 15 Sep. 2021
  • His ashen skin is snaked with circuitry, his voice flattened into the cold register of the Borg, a cybernetic collective that assimilates entire civilizations and reshapes them in its own image.
    — Jp Mangalindan, Time, 5 Apr. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'ashen.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: