Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun A room for drawing; specifically, the apartment, in an engineer's shop where patterns and plans are prepared.
  • noun A room appropriated for the reception of company; a room in which distinguished personages hold levees, or private persons receive parties, etc.
  • noun The company assembled in a drawing-room.
  • noun A formal reception of company at the English court, or by persons in high station: as, to hold a drawing-room.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A room appropriated for the reception of company; a room to which company withdraws from the dining room.
  • noun The company assembled in such a room; also, a reception of company in it.
  • noun See Palace car, under Car.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a private compartment on a sleeping car with three bunks and a toilet
  • noun a formal room where visitors can be received and entertained

Etymologies

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Examples

  • And there is a splendid climax when Hildegard Bechtler's drawing-room set becomes a minefield in which lights sizzle and flare, pictures fall and even a chandelier ominously descends in Phantom of the Opera style.

    Blithe Spirit – review 2011

  • Painters and Their Work, (1979), lays down the difficulties female artists faced: competing obligations of marriage and motherhood; the restrictions against women seeking art training; male willingness to accept women's painting only as a benign drawing-room recreation but not as a professional activity for monetary gain, which might put a woman in the public eye; and perceptions of women's intellectual inability to tackle "serious," large-scale historical, mythical, or biblical subjects.

    Interview with Susan Vreeland 2010

  • Gentlemen in this country do smoke, when at home, in the drawing-room and dining-room j there is no doubt about that; that is, when the women of the family do not object.

    Smoking Etiquette | Edwardian Promenade 2010

  • So many women smoke themselves, that in some houses even the drawing-room is thrown open to Princess Nicotine.

    Smoking Etiquette | Edwardian Promenade 2010

  • On arrival, ladies and gentlemen would take off their cloaks in the cloakroom or leave them in the hall with the servant before entering the drawing-room, where the host and hostess awaited them.

    Dining and Dinners | Edwardian Promenade 2010

  • It looks like a Victorian drawing-room drama until the orchestra appears behind a scrim and the actors begin singing.

    A Victorian Drama—With Show Tunes Ellen Gamerman 2011

  • The assumption is understandable, given that we see him at one memorable point shooting holes in his drawing-room wall, out of sheer boredom.

    Roush Review: A Contemporary Sherlock 2010

  • However, the advancements in media and citizen journalism has made it difficult for the Ministers and their gangs to cover up their blunders and drawing-room statements.

    Global Voices in English » Pakistan: A Humanitarian Crisis 2009

  • In one of the last glimpses we have of Nellie in the diary, she is standing “by the drawing-room door in the full light, white & pink, with her funny rather foolish mulish face.”

    Imperfect Union 2009

  • Sometimes the gentlemen are invited into another apartment for smoking, and rejoin the ladies in the drawing-room after they have disposed of their cigars.

    Smoking Etiquette | Edwardian Promenade 2010

Comments

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  • In the drawing-room sat quite the grandest lady Yashima had yet seen in England. ... Merely to be in the same room as her must surely be a social event of magnitude. - ''Yashima, or, The Gorgeous West'' by R T Sherwood, 1931.

    December 24, 2008

  • See also drawingroom.

    December 24, 2008

  • See also drawing room.

    December 24, 2008