below stairs
Where staff works
Below stairs refers to the servants' quarters in a large house, traditionally located in the basement or lower level.
The phrase distinguishes the working domain of household staff from the upper floors where the family lived: The cook ruled below stairs.
It evokes the rigid class divisions of Victorian and Edwardian households, where servants and employers occupied separate worlds under one roof.
- servantsHired household workers
- servants' quartersHousing for domestic employees
- domesticOf the home
- kitchenFood preparation room
- sculleryRoom for dishwashing
scullery maid · housekeeper · butler · lady's maid · maid · cook · footman · cellar · downstairs · quarters · service · service entrance · Victorian · Downton · staff · laundry · pantry · ringing bells
- servant quartersservants, servant, domestic staff, household staff, downstairs
- British historyWilliam the Conqueror, Victorian era, Elizabethan era, English Civil War, Tudor era
- historic diningmedieval feast, medieval feasts, Roman banquet, royal banquet, state dinner
- Victorian etiquettecalling hours, visiting cards, chaperoning, propriety, decorum
below stairsupstairs
On a higher level
landed gentry · upper class · high society · nobility · polite society
below, stairs, stair, lower, lowest, lowness, stairway, staircase, stairwell