deird_lj: (Default)
deird_lj ([personal profile] deird_lj) wrote2010-04-21 02:04 pm
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gillo: (Words)

[personal profile] gillo 2010-04-21 09:07 am (UTC)(link)
It's only a pantry if it's big enough to walk into and move in. Otherwise it's a cupboard. Or the fridge.

Edited to add that the built-in place off the landing where the hot-water tank is and the sheets/towels are kept is an airing cupboard. In our dank, damp country we like to keep our linen somewhere warm.
Edited 2010-04-21 09:21 (UTC)
deird1: Fred looking pretty and thoughful (Default)

[personal profile] deird1 2010-04-21 10:25 am (UTC)(link)
Oh... is that what an airing cupboard is? I always wondered.
gillo: (All happy families)

[personal profile] gillo 2010-04-23 02:26 pm (UTC)(link)
Yes - most houses in Britain are heated by hot water piped through radiators, and even before the days when full heating was common, the hot water was generally heated by a "back boiler" arrangement which used waste heat from the fire in the main family room. The storage place for said hot water is almost always a very large, lagged tank, in a cupboard with shelves above it, usually merely slats, so the towels and bedlinen can be kept dry and lightly warmed.

A country which is cold half the year and damp most of some years requires that sort of set-up, or you end up with damp sheets - something our Victorian forebears thought caused all sorts of illnesses, like pneumonia.

[identity profile] gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com 2010-04-21 10:18 pm (UTC)(link)
It's only a pantry if it's big enough to walk into and move in.

Huh. We have some non-walk-in-able pantries. Basically, it looks like a closet from the outside, but you open it up and it's just shelves. No room to walk in, though, but it still counts as a pantry.