"Parlour," "Drawing Room" and "Lounge" - What's the difference?

I’ve heard these terms used in innumerable novels and movies. They all seem to be defined as “a room for entertaining guests” - but are the terms interchangeable or are there distinctions of form or function?

“Parlour”, orginally, was a room for talking in. It seems to have originated in monasteries, where the parlour was the room in which a visitor who had come to see a monk could meet and converse with him. It then extended to the room in a private house in which visitors were received and entertained.

The “drawing room” was the room to which people withdrew after dinner which, naturally, was taken in the “dining room”. It could be that everyone withdrew so that the servants could clean up the dining room, or in some societies the women withdrew, leaving the men to port and conversation over the remains of the dinner.

A “lounge” was a room for resting or reclining in. As a name for a room in a house, it’s much the most recent, first turning up in the 1880s.

In all but the very largest houses, there are not separate rooms for conversation with visitors, for withdrawing after dinner and for relaxing; one room serves all these functions, so the terms are virtually interchangeable. The question of which term a person or family prefers may well be a marker of social class or family background.

Parlors are where young men visited their date while relatives were close by to chaperon. If they had dated for awhile, there was perhaps a little sparking at the end of the date.

I believe UDS has this one in the bag.

Or generation. My grandparents’ house had a drawing room. My parents had a sitting room. We have a living room. Different names, same function.

The front parlour was also the room where dead bodies were displayed back when home funerals used to be common (hence expression “funeral parlour” for a mortuary).

Some houses survive with “Double Parlors” - a very high-end feature - two “living rooms”, typically tandem - the front parlor was for entertaining the Parson when he dropped by to score a free Sunday dinner.
It was kept closed to kids except for viewing the dead. Pocket doors were used (commonly) to shut off the front parlor.

If you see a Victorian with a long porch and doors at the front and at the end (on the side of the house) of the porch, it probably was a double parlor.

There were rooms for both the male of the house and the female - I suspect the Drawing room served the purpose of the Library in more affluent homes- where the gents would retire, put on smoking jackets* and enjoy a cigar while the women cleaned up the dining mess.

She, on the other hand, had the “Fainting” room - as in “I feel faint” and escape the noise that way.
This became a “sewing room”, and maybe, in a spirit on unisex (bad idea, ladies) has given way to “lounge”.’’

  • Heavily padded, quilted crotch-length wrap-arounds with tied belts (very thick, short robe). Worn and stored only in the room with smoke - they were to absorb the stench.

[Catherwood] You may wait here in the sitting room, or you may sit here in the waiting room [/Catherwood]

If you don’t get it, I can’t help you.

Survive…? Of my parents and my in-laws, both of their homes have these 2 living rooms and they are not older houses. The living rooms are always one more formal than the other, you know- one for family and one for guests. I didn’t know it was a high-end feature though- I thought all larger houses had these. I didn’t live in any of our houses growing up that did not have this dual living room situation. My parents are not Bill & Melinda Gates or anywhere near that kind of wealth.

Love the two living rooms deal though. My favorite room in the house- the STUDY. I guess it would ring bells as a “den”, in today’s world. The study was not the living room nor a converted bedroom- but an easily accessible yet not near any heavily trafficked areas of the house, hence the “study” name I guess. It was the place where you went to go read, or sleep or whatever. I never thought about how rare that room was until I started looking at houses myself as an adult grown up and noticed that houses now don’t have them. It’s kind of a necessity, I think.

Look at the 2 doors. Sometimes one has a square topped window opening, the other arched. Traditionally the arched door was only used for the wake/funeral.

Obviously I am from the quality, by comparison with you ;). I grew up in a house with a drawing room; my house has a sitting room.

As for the “double parlours” referred to in other posts, a common arrangement in even quite modest Irish houses was a pair of adjoining reception rooms divided by double or folding doors. One of these was a drawing/sitting/living room, the other might serve either as a formal dining room or a second sitting/living/family room, according to whether the family felt the need for a formal dining room, and whether the kitchen was large enough to eat in comfortably.

My house, builts in the 50s, has what the estate agent (realtor) would describe as 2 recep (two reception rooms) a rather quaint description but we all know what it means.

When it was built, there were three rooms on the ground floor - What I would have called a ‘front’ room or dining room, a sitting room and a kitchen. The previous owner removed the internal wall separating the two living areas making one large room. I have separated them again with book cases, creating a sitting room and a study/dining room/library.

In a relatively small house, floor space has to work for its living.

In my family there was “the room” or the “good room” which was kept pristine for high profile visitors, typically only used during weddings, wakes, stations, etc.

I first read that as “spanking”.

x2

And here I thought that the difference was that the purpose of the lounge was murder (with or without the candlestick, committed by or not by Miss Scarlett) whereas the other two were for…some other purpose.

Did someone leave the grail-shaped beacon on again?

Not sure how this applies to British Britishland, but back in the days of the Roman Empire well-to-do families used the various lounges in theirs homes as a way to enforce an informal hierarchy among their guests : the very good, very influent, very *rich *friends got to be wined and dined in the poshest, most lavishly decorated room in the house ; the friends of *those *guys were dined in the nice_but_not_so_nice room ; and the scum were parked right next to the servants’ quarters (where, ironically, they probably got better service).

So that would be one reason to have 3+ rooms with the same general function.

“I wonder where Ruth is?”

My home growing up had a similar arrangement. My parents called them the “living room” and the “family room.” The living room had the fancy, uncomfortable furniture and was reserved for celebrations and/or adult gatherings. The family room had the comfortable furniture and the TV, and it was where the kids played and everyone hung out in the evenings.