The origin and meaning of the phrase drawing room.
A drawing room is a room in a house where visitors can be entertained and a historical term for a living room.The first written appearance of the withdrawing room and withdrawing chamber was in 1642.In a large 16th to early 18th century English house, a withdrawing room was a room to which the owner, his wife, or a distinguished guest who was occupying one of the main apartments in the house could "withdraw" for more privacy.The great chamber's descendant, the state room, was often the location of the formal bedroom.[3]
It can be used as a convenient name for a second or further reception room in modern houses, but there is no function associated with the name.
In 18th-century London, the royal morning reception that the French called levées were called "drawing rooms", with the sense that privileged members of court would gather in the drawing room outside the king's bedroom, where he would make his first formal public appearance.
The drawing room was off the parlor in the White House of the Confederacy during the American Civil War.The men stayed in the parlor to talk politics while the women went to the drawing room for their own discussion.In the Southern United States, this practice was common.
This is the modern form of the Lady's Withdrawing-room, otherwise known as the Parlour or the Chamber of mediaeval plan.The only Sitting-room of the family is the Morning room.The family and their guests assemble before dinner when the ladies receive calls throughout the day.The ladies leave after dinner and are joined by the gentlemen for the evening.The reception room is used for evening parties.There is only one kind of Drawing-room, and it is the one with the simplest gentlewoman in the neighborhood....A good size for a very superior apartment is 20 by 30 to 26 by 40, which is 16 feet wide by 18 to 20 feet long.
The ladies of a dinner party left the drawing room and the gentlemen were left at the table.After an interval of conversation, often accompanied by brandy or port and sometimes cigars, the gentlemen rejoined the ladies in the drawing room.
In Britain, the term drawing room is only used by those who have other reception rooms, such as a morning room, a 19th-century designation for a sitting room suited for daytime calls.Adults of the family use the drawing room as the smartest room in the house when entertaining.In India and Pakistan, this term is used in larger urban houses of the cities where there are many rooms.