Keeping Rooms have been around for, dare I say, centuries? Well yes, it’s true, and up until recently, they haven’t been commonplace in American interior design. These once ubiquitous household rooms likely fell out of vogue, or rather their need, when modern conveniences like indoor plumbing and oil or gas heat became the norm in American homes.

So what is a keeping room?

Keeping rooms were born from a strictly functional need. A keeping room, is a space built adjacent to the kitchen. It was a space where friends and family could gather and keep warm to carry on daily home-keepings tasks like sewing, books and games, as well as keep the cook company while they prepare a meal. Because the kitchen has historically and continues to be the “heart of the home” it’s an area of the house where everyone naturally gravitates to. The keeping room is the perfect solution for the overflow of bodies that are typically found to be hovering around the kitchen.

Design by: Ashley Whittiker / Photo: OneKey MLS

This keeping room designed by Ashley Whittaker hosts a dining moment along with a comfortable cozy seating arrangement, all made more cozy with a wood burning fireplace.

Keeping Rooms vs Family Rooms and Dens

One important design detail to recognize with keeping rooms vs family rooms or dining nooks is that they traditionally always had and should have a fireplace. This is because in older homes there were only so many places that were heated. The kitchen was one of them, thanks to the stove or earlier the open fireplace used to cook meals therefore this was naturally a place for people to gather to keep warm. Setting a few comfortable arm chairs in front of the fire was only the next obvious step to this arrangement. Which is the next necessary detail about what sets keeping rooms apart from other warm rooms adjacent to the kitchen. They must be made for comfort with upholstered furniture, daybeds or lounges included. Lastly, one thing that set them apart from family rooms or dens is size and location. Typically family rooms are located in the middle of the home - not necessarily next to a kitchen and larger than a cozy keeping room. Dens are entirely secluded spaces. Keeping rooms were in a way, the historic version of an open floor plan, often not only being adjacent to the kitchen but also open to it and perhaps architecturally a part of the same space.

Designed by Nick Olsen, this keeping room located in a Sag Harbor has a mix of contemporary and traditional furnishings.

This space in a Boston Townhome by interior designer Thad Hayes and architect Dell Mitchell is a great example of how to create a modern interpretation of a keeping room. It’s small, but still a place to cozy up by the fire just off the kitchen.

This home is actually a new build by Country Carpenters with a very traditional take on a keeping room with the two upholstered chairs flanking the fireplace and the informal dining area just off the kitchen (you can spot the refrigerator is at the far right of the frame).

This space designed by decorator Mark Cunningham and architect Hugh Weisman is a Martha’s Vineyard summer home. The Ellsworth Kelly lithograph hung above the fireplace is a nice juxtaposition to the 19th-century tavern table and antique chairs. The opposite view of the same room shown below, shows how the seating area is set just off the kitchen.

Nowadays, keeping rooms can be small, tidy, yet comfortable spaces just off the kitchen with a fireplace or a large room complete with a television, a full sized sectional sofa but now we refer to them as a family room (though technically, that’s not accurate). Ultimately though, as long as they hold some of those key design details, their original purposes haven’t evolved much.

Design by: Studio Laloc / Photo: Lauren L Caron © 2024

The above room in our Normandy Park Project can be considered a modern day keeping room, although we typically refer to this space as the family room of this home. It is slightly large for a keeping room, but it does however have fireplace with comfortable seating and is set just off the kitchen, as shown in the below image.

My Family’s Keeping Room

My childhood home had and still has a keeping room. We ate all of our family meals there, conversed and sometimes napped. It is the warmest room in the house! The original fireplace still remains but my parents installed a wood stove when we first moved there and they remodeled the kitchen. In our keeping room, there are two upholstered loveseats, a few occasional chairs and Windsor style dining chairs set around a round tilt-top dining table. I don’t have great photos of this room, the best ones I can share are shown below. Hopefully the images do provide proof of it being one of the most comfortable and homey rooms in the house.

As you can see in the above images, my parents’ keeping room is well lived-in. These photos are not styled or staged but just images of the room I snapped while visiting home. The below image is from our wedding day, when my photographer snapped a candid of me looking out the kitchen window at the ceremony. You can see on the far left side of the image a corner of a sofa under the clock, that is where I was sitting when I took the image of the yellow Hitchcock chair and dining table with the upholstered bench.

I hope after reading this you can feel like an expert on keeping rooms! Perhaps have realized that your childhood home or even current home has what may be considered a keeping room. Anything regarding keeping rooms that you think is important to add?

Cheers, Lauren

Defining Rooms: Keeping Rooms

So what is a keeping room?

Keeping Rooms vs Family Rooms and Dens

My Family’s Keeping Room