# European housing - what's with all the doors and corridors? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 14, 2019, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713 "2019-01-14T01:16:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![SanVito](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sanvito/32/2805_2.png) [@SanVito](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SanVito)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 9:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/121 "2019-01-16T09:25:43Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > I forgot to measure the height of my bed, but generally speaking, being a person of approx 5 ft 8 in height (173 cm), I expect to be able to sit on the edge of a bed and my feet not touch the floor, or if they do, my knees should still be lower than my hips. If my feet touch the floor while sitting upright and my knees are higher than my hips, then the bed is too low. Wha, how do you put your shoes on? I’m 5’ 6", and I expect to be able to sit on my bed, with my feet on the floor. My knees at a right angle. If I can’t do this, the bed is too high (this is UK). ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 10:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/122 "2019-01-16T10:12:58Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > Yes, I envisioned that. That people might tend to stay longer in one place over here, hence have a strongest tendency to consider a place as their own. I know a number of people who rent and haven’t moved in decades. In fact my parents rented the same place for I think almost 30 years, leaving it only when they retired (and they changed the kitchen cabinets twice, when I think of it). Now I really don’t know how different it is from this point of view, though. There are certainly statistics about this out there. [Four or five](https://www.realestate.com.au/news/victorian-renters-stay-in-the-same-home-longer-than-the-national-average/) years is the norm here, apparently ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/123 "2019-01-16T13:34:41Z")
> [@rat\_avatar](#): > > I think some of these are specific to Germany, but related to the locks requiring a key from the inside. > > Fire codes in the US require egress doors to be usable without a key due to tragic events like the [Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triangle_Shirtwaist_Factory_fire), [Cocoanut Grove Nightclub Fire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocoanut_Grove_fire), and the [Iroquois Theater Fire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iroquois_Theatre_fire) > > [Except as specifically permitted by this section, egress doors shall be readily openable from the egress side without the use of a key or special knowledge or effort.](https://up.codes/s/door-operations) > > I am betting if/when a similar loss of life is caused by egress doors that require a key happens in Germany they will also enact similar codes. In the US you are correct so far as public spaces are concerned, but they are allowable in the home. Otherwise there would be no market for a [double cylinder](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KW4Q27Y/ref=twister_B01020O5YO?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1) lockset. When I was living in a dodgy neighborhood in a condo with a window close to the front door, I installed one but had a key on a nail in case of fire. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/124 "2019-01-16T19:19:44Z")
In Europe, more construction is concrete, or otherwise fire proof, than in the US. ---
**Author:** ![CarnalK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnalk/32/486_2.png) [@CarnalK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CarnalK)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 9:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/125 "2019-01-16T21:32:32Z")
From my time in Germany as a youngster, the OPs description definitely runs true. Doors for every room with locks on them. It was funny because it was these old timey locks that basically used miniature medieval keys, big blocky things - you could actually peek through the keyhole. A couple of the doors we just took off the hinges and stored away to make space. But this was way back early 80s. ---
**Author:** ![MichaelEmouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/michaelemouse/32/101_2.png) [@MichaelEmouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MichaelEmouse)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 9:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/126 "2019-01-16T21:47:35Z")
> [@Lord\_Feldon](#): > > In my experience, in the suburban homes where these open plans are most common, the front door is not necessarily the door most commonly used by the residents. I’ve often seen that situation where the front door is barely used. Is the door there out of some vestigial sense that the house ought to have a front door even if it’s rarely ever used? If the side door is the most commonly used door, should it’s be considered the main door? ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [January 16, 2019, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/127 "2019-01-16T22:13:18Z")
> [@MichaelEmouse](#): > > I’ve often seen that situation where the front door is barely used. Is the door there out of some vestigial sense that the house ought to have a front door even if it’s rarely ever used? If the side door is the most commonly used door, should it’s be considered the main door? It’s all just part of the tradition of keeping ‘things for best’; the parlour no-one but guests ever sits in, the good china that only gets brought out for ‘company’, and the front door that’s only opened for occasions like weddings, funerals and visits from special visitors. When I was little, we lived in a house without a front door, though the rest of the design was like the standard houses in the area which all had one, and there was an obvious place in the layout where it ‘should’ have been (in fact, the next owners added one as part of an extension). The house was originally one part of the Duke of Westminster’s estate, rented out to estate workers. The story I got told goes; the Duke once went round to see one of the tenants, and being a Duke, therefore considering himself a special visitor, went to the front door. The tenants never used the front door, and when they tried to open it, it’d swelled up, and stuck. They couldn’t budge the thing. He had to go round the kitchen door, like the milkman and the other common folk. He was, according to the tale, so peeved about this that the next bunch of houses he had built were laid out almost exactly the same as the previous lot, but without a front door; if the tenants weren’t going to use the front door, they weren’t going to get one. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/128 "2019-01-17T02:08:03Z")
elmers magical liquid > [@Acsenray](#): > > My last three residences—a one-bedroom apartment and two houses of approx 1,000 sq ft—were all built in the 1940s and 1950s. They are all open in the kitchen/dining/living areas. The front doors open into the living areas. Corridors and doors are only in the bedroom and bathroom section. > > In fact, of all the residences I’ve lived in in my life I have never lived in a place where the kitchen or living room have doors. The only places with an entrance hall have been my parents’ large suburban houses where there’s no need to use space efficiently. > You have a coat closet off the living room. Even in my parents’ houses, if your umbrella or boots were excessively wet or dirty, you left them outside. these days its referred as a “mud room” because its where ya take all the damp wet stuff off when it rains and snows …here in the southern ca desert it rarely does either so they don’t build em and when it does rain ya either take em off outside or ya get wet and muddy floors …… ---
**Author:** ![Melbourne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b5e925/32.png) [@Melbourne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Melbourne)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/129 "2019-01-17T02:10:29Z")
I’ve lived in Aus most of my life. Our 1960’s ranch-style house in Arizona was open-plan with corridors and built-in kitchen cupboards. It had two American-style bathrooms. My 1990’s tract house in Melbourne is open-plan without corridors, and has built in cupboards. We have an American-style en-suite, and an English-style back bathroom and separate toilet. The _old_(pre-war) houses I’ve lived in in Melbourne were built with a separate out-house, then converted to indoor plumbing. The earlier conversions showed the cultural and regulatory effects of the earlier standard: separate toilet, at least two doors. In our current house, there is only one door between the kitchen and the toilet. The fact that the toilet is separate from the bath is because, with shared facilities, it lets one person use the toilet while another is using the shower. But it’s a very cheap house, and the toilet doesn’t have a sink, so you still need to go to the laundry or use the shower room to wash your hands. The old houses were all corridor/hallway with doors. Except in the smallest town-houses, the hallway walls were structural walls (supporting the roof) There was no heating in Melbourne before the 1980’s, and you closed all doors to keep the heat in. There was no built-in storage or bench space _at all_. In the bedrooms you’d put a wardrobe and a bed: in the kitchen a kitchen cupboard and a kitchen table. In the oldest houses, the kitchens were attached at the back, as was the washroom. In our house in PNG, the kitchen was entirely separate, to reduce fire risk, but in Melbourne the separation reflected (in expensive houses) the separation of function, and (in poor houses) the separation of building materials: you’d make the bedroom and parlour as nice as you could, and kitchen as cheap as you could. I’ll also note that in London, the big townhouses of the very rich were subdivided into “flats”. That gave a structural organization that did not reflect the original design of the building. In Germany, a traditional ordinary was to live for middle-class city-dwellers was a walk-up apartment building organized around a central courtyard, You didn’t get “ranch house” or “cottage” floor plans in that kind of building. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 2:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/130 "2019-01-17T02:12:16Z")
> [@SanVito](#): > > Wha, how do you put your shoes on? I’m 5’ 6", and I expect to be able to sit on my bed, with my feet on the floor. My knees at a right angle. If I can’t do this, the bed is too high (this is UK). Who keeps shoes in the bedroom? Disgusting. I have slippers next to my bed. You just slide your toes into them and stand up. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/131 "2019-01-17T04:35:50Z")
> [@Melbourne](#): > > …The earlier conversions showed the cultural and regulatory effects of the earlier standard: separate toilet, at least two doors… The oldest building I’ve lived in was a pre-war apartment building in NYC. It had a full bathroom (toilet, sink, tub with shower) near the bedrooms, and it had what we called the “water closet” in the kitchen. It was a large closet with a toilet in it. There was a door, but if you wanted to wash your hands after using the toilet, you used the kitchen sink, which was just on the other side of the wall. (The water closet also had a large shelf above the toilet, up high, out of reach of children. The building had tall ceilings, so there was lots of room there. We kept all our toxic cleaning materials and such up there.) ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/132 "2019-01-17T05:23:01Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Who keeps shoes in the bedroom? Disgusting. I have slippers next to my bed. You just slide your toes into them and stand up. For starters, everybody who’s ever rented one room. Or anybody who doesn’t have a dressing room. Wanna get even more shocked? In Europe, it’s common for people to share rooms with other people they don’t have sex with! There are families of six living in homes with three bedrooms and one bathroom. Wait… aren’t you also the poster who thought any hotel that doesn’t have a kitchenette in every room is a dumpster? Your main issue doesn’t seem to be even with “OMG how come Euros do things differently”, you begin by having problems with the concept of “population density”. And yeah, also with understanding that it’s called “abroad” because it’s not your backyard. ---
**Author:** ![Bear\_Nenno](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bear_nenno/32/3358_2.png) [@Bear\_Nenno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bear_Nenno)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 6:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/133 "2019-01-17T06:56:39Z")
> [@JR\_Brown](#): > > Actually, I’m having difficulty imagining how the just-screw-it-to-the-wall cabinets you describe would even work; do you have a link to some pictures somewhere? This was the type of modular kitchen furniture I was talking about. Notice how it is completely free standing. > **[Küchenzeilen](https://www.wayfair.de/moebel/sb0/kuechenzeilen-c1874235.html?redir_sku=XZM1199)** > > Küchenzeilen JETZT online kaufen & bequem liefern lassen! Entdecke unsere exklusive Auswahl & Top-Marken ➤ Genieße Ratenzahlung & einen Top Service ✔ Get yourself a [sink](https://www.wayfair.de/moebel/pdp/held-moebel-kuechenunterschrank-start-hkm1067.html), add an oven, and you’re all set. Or you can get a complete kit, like this: > **[Küchenschränke](https://www.wayfair.de/moebel/sb0/kuechenschraenke-c1859692.html?redir_sku=HKM1029)** > > Küchenschränke JETZT online kaufen & bequem liefern lassen! Entdecke unsere exklusive Auswahl & Top-Marken ➤ Genieße Ratenzahlung & einen Top Service ✔ They can get even cheaper (and much more expensive), but notice how it’s mostly just a couple of large pieces. It’s not hard to find a way to make that fit the next kitchen you move to. That tall portion on the left can be placed on an opposite wall, even. It can be completely rearranged. The upper cabinets just screw into the wall. No need to find the studs, because your walls are most likely made of some kind of stone or brick. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 11:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/134 "2019-01-17T11:17:34Z")
- - ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 11:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/135 "2019-01-17T11:18:35Z")
—- ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/136 "2019-01-17T12:13:51Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > For starters, everybody who’s ever rented one room. Or anybody who doesn’t have a dressing room. Wanna get even more shocked? In Europe, it’s common for people to share rooms with other people they don’t have sex with! Long ago I had a girlfriend who’d spent a year at the Sorbonne. She mentioned that Parisian apartment rents were so high almost all undergraduates either lived with their parents or had two or three roommates in an apartment, not necessarily in separate bedrooms. Nowadays San Francisco is getting there. When I looked a year ago the only district where the minimum rent for a 1br apartment was under $3,000 a month was Outer Sunset, and there it was $2,800; popular hotspots like Marina were over $4,000. Almost everyone single rents a room instead of a whole apartment. **DesertWife** ’s daughter and her husband both make good money and they are living in the upper floor of a house in Central Richmond that was converted into an apartment. Some single guy lives on the bottom floor and the owner is living in the basement. A single guy I know had two bedroom renters in his home in Mission Terrace and was renovating the basement so he could put a third in there. Even with the three renters, the mortgage would not be covered but it was close, he said. ---
**Author:** ![clairobscur](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/839c29/32.png) [@clairobscur](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/clairobscur)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/137 "2019-01-17T12:25:37Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > Long ago I had a girlfriend who’d spent a year at the Sorbonne. She mentioned that Parisian apartment rents were so high almost all undergraduates either lived with their parents or had two or three roommates in an apartment, not necessarily in separate bedrooms. > > Nowadays San Francisco is getting there. When I looked a year ago the only district where the minimum rent for a 1br apartment was under $3,000 a month was Outer Sunset, and there it was $2,800; popular hotspots like Marina were over $4,000. Almost everyone single rents a room instead of a whole apartment. Paris is a long way from that. The cheapest rents in Paris proper are at about €550-600. For € 700, you’ll find something, probably even livable. On the other hand, I suspect that surfaces are much smaller. One bedroom means 15-20 square meters (160-220 square feet, apparently). ---
**Author:** ![Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Springtime_for_Spacers)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 12:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/138 "2019-01-17T12:37:08Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > Who keeps shoes in the bedroom? Disgusting. I have slippers next to my bed. You just slide your toes into them and stand up. \*Your \*shoes might be disgusting. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/139 "2019-01-17T13:02:59Z")
> [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](#): > > \*Your \*shoes might be disgusting. Yeah, what’s disgusting about shoes? I keep my underwear in my bedroom, and that goes next to my _butt_. (No skid marks, though.) ---
**Author:** ![Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Springtime\_for\_Spacers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Springtime_for_Spacers)\ **Post date:** [January 17, 2019, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713/140 "2019-01-17T17:09:16Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Yeah, what’s disgusting about shoes? > > I keep my underwear in my bedroom, and that goes next to my _butt_. > > (No skid marks, though.) I have a laundry basket in my bedroom - the horror! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/european-housing-whats-with-all-the-doors-and-corridors/827713.md?page=8)