Learn Hardcore Spanish (Latin America): Mi dormitorio tiene una pared marrón y otra blanca. - My bedroom has one brown wall and another white one.

You also don’t use “la otra” here because “la otra” usually means “the other (one)”, referring to a specific other one that both speakers already know about.

In this sentence:

una pared marrón = one brown wall
y otra blanca = and another (one), white

We’re just saying there is a second wall with a different color, not “the other wall” that’s already known in the conversation. So:

✅ Mi dormitorio tiene una pared marrón y otra blanca.
❌ Mi dormitorio tiene una pared marrón y una otra blanca.
❌ Mi dormitorio tiene una pared marrón y la otra blanca. (This would sound like: “My bedroom has a brown wall and the other one is white,” implying maybe only two walls or a specific known “other” wall. It can be correct in some contexts but changes the nuance.)

Why is “otra” feminine? Shouldn’t it be “otro”?

“Otra” agrees in gender and number with the noun it replaces or refers to.

The implied phrase is:

otra (pared) blanca

Since pared is feminine (*la pared*) and singular, we must use the feminine singular form of “other”:

otro → masculine singular (e.g. otro libro)
otra → feminine singular (e.g. otra pared)
otros → masculine plural (e.g. otros libros)
otras → feminine plural (e.g. otras paredes)

So here:

pared → feminine singular → otra

Why do the colors appear after the noun: “pared marrón” and not “marrón pared”?

In Spanish, most adjectives, including colors, normally go after the noun:

una pared marrón = a brown wall
un carro rojo = a red car
una camisa azul = a blue shirt

If you put the color before the noun (marrón pared), it sounds ungrammatical. Color adjectives almost never come before the noun in normal usage.

So, the natural order is:

noun + color adjective

→ pared marrón, pared blanca

Why is it “marrón” and not “marróna” to agree with “pared”?

Not all adjectives change in the same way. Adjectives ending in:

-o usually have masculine and feminine forms:
- rojo / roja (red), blanco / blanca (white)
-e or a consonant usually have one single form for both masculine and feminine:
- grande → un perro grande, una casa grande
- marrón → un sofá marrón, una pared marrón

So “marrón” doesn’t change for gender; it only changes for number:

singular: marrón
plural: marrones

Examples:

una pared marrón (feminine, singular)
dos paredes marrones (feminine, plural)

What’s the difference between “marrón”, “café”, and “castaño” for “brown”?

In Latin America, all three exist, but they’re used differently and vary by country:

marrón
- Common in many countries for the color brown in general.
- una pared marrón, una mesa marrón
café
- Literally “coffee,” but also used as a color.
- Very common in much of Latin America for the color brown, especially for objects, clothes, furniture, etc.
- unos zapatos café / cafés, una chaqueta café
castaño
- Most commonly used for hair color and sometimes eye color.
- pelo castaño = brown hair
- ojos castaños = brown eyes

You would not normally say:

❌ una pared castaña (sounds odd)

For a wall, “marrón” or “color café” is more natural, depending on the region:

una pared marrón
una pared color café

Why is it “Mi dormitorio tiene…” and not “Hay…”?

Both are possible but have different focuses:

Mi dormitorio tiene una pared marrón y otra blanca.
- Literally: My bedroom has a brown wall and another white one.
- Focuses on what the bedroom possesses or includes.
En mi dormitorio hay una pared marrón y otra blanca.
- Literally: In my bedroom there is a brown wall and another white one.
- Uses “hay” to state existence: there is / there are.

Both are grammatically correct. The original sentence uses “tiene” to talk about the features of the bedroom, like saying “My bedroom has a large window, has two lamps,” etc.

With rooms and other locations, speakers can choose either “tiene” or “hay” depending on whether they want to express:

what the room has → tiene
what exists in / is found in the room → hay

What is the difference between “dormitorio”, “habitación”, and “cuarto”?

All three can mean “bedroom”, but usage depends on region and context:

dormitorio
- Neutral, standard word for bedroom.
- Common in Spain and understood everywhere in the Spanish-speaking world.
- Slightly more formal / standard-sounding.
habitación
- Literally “room.” In hotels it usually means “room” (not necessarily just a bedroom):
  - una habitación doble = a double room
- As “bedroom,” it’s common in Spain and also understood elsewhere.
cuarto
- Literally “room,” often used as “bedroom” in many Latin American countries.
- Very common in everyday speech:
  - Voy a mi cuarto. = I’m going to my room / bedroom.

In Latin America, in everyday conversations, you’ll often hear “cuarto” or “pieza” (in some regions) for “bedroom,” but “dormitorio” is a safe, neutral, clear choice and works well in learning contexts.

Why is the subject “Mi dormitorio” instead of just “Tiene una pared…”?

Spanish can drop subject pronouns (like yo, tú, él), but usually cannot drop full noun subjects (mi dormitorio) unless it’s clear from the previous sentence.

Compare:

Yo tengo sueño. → Often just Tengo sueño. (drop “yo”)
Mi dormitorio tiene… → You generally don’t drop “Mi dormitorio” unless it’s very obvious from context:
- If the previous sentence was “Mi dormitorio es pequeño.”, then the next sentence could be:
  - Tiene una pared marrón y otra blanca. (Now “tiene” obviously refers to “mi dormitorio”.)

In an isolated sentence like the one you gave, we include “Mi dormitorio” to make the subject clear.

Why is “dormitorio” masculine (mi dormitorio, not mi dormitorioa)?

The grammatical gender of nouns in Spanish is largely arbitrary and must be memorized.

dormitorio ends in -o, and most nouns ending in -o are masculine:
- el dormitorio, el libro, el carro

So we say:

el dormitorio
mi dormitorio (because mi doesn’t change for gender, only for number: mi / mis)

Contrast with:

la habitación (feminine) → mi habitación, una habitación
la pared (feminine) → una pared, la pared

Why do the adjectives “marrón” and “blanca” agree with “pared”?

In Spanish, adjectives must agree with the noun they describe in gender (masculine/feminine) and number (singular/plural):

pared is feminine, singular:
- una pared alta (a tall wall)
- una pared blanca (a white wall)

In the full, “un-shortened” version, the sentence is:

Mi dormitorio tiene una pared marrón y otra pared blanca.

Here:

marrón = same number (singular). It doesn’t change for gender.
blanca = feminine singular to match pared (blanco → blanca).

When we omit the second “pared”, the agreement still follows the implied noun:

otra (pared) blanca → blanca still feminine singular because pared is understood.

Is “otra blanca” always understood as “otra pared blanca”? Can I drop nouns like this in other cases too?

Yes. In Spanish you can often omit a repeated noun if it’s clear from context. The adjective (or “otro/otra”) stays and the noun is implied:

Tengo una camisa roja y otra blanca.
→ camisa is understood after otra.
→ I have a red shirt and another white (one).
Quiero esta silla negra y no esa blanca.
→ silla is understood after blanca.
→ I want this black chair, not that white one.

In your sentence:

una pared marrón y otra blanca
= una pared marrón y otra (pared) blanca

This is common and natural. Native speakers use this omission a lot to avoid repeating the same noun.

If my room has more than two walls, does “una pared marrón y otra blanca” sound wrong?

No. “Otra” does not necessarily mean “the only other one”; it simply means “another / a different one.”

The sentence doesn’t specify how many total walls there are. It just says:

Of the walls in your bedroom, one is brown and another one is white.

You could have 2, 3, 4, or more walls; the sentence is still fine. If you wanted to say only two walls in total, you’d need extra information or a different wording, for example:

Mi dormitorio solo tiene dos paredes: una marrón y otra blanca.
= My bedroom only has two walls: one brown and the other white.