When we first bought the house and even after walking through it several times, the number of rooms and their layouts continued to perplex us. There were so many that you walked through to reach another and seemed to connect to a second one. Some of the layouts began to seem almost as though these rooms were a “set.” This happened throughout. It was time for a little more research. After all, if we know how it was, hopefully we can put it back.

Let me back up a little. I need to explain why we had to stop and figure out the rooms. Now that the heating and hot water/plumbing were functioning, it was time to tackle the wiring. The contractors who installed the heating units ran new wiring for their systems but the rest of wiring we had not touched. Some of it, we figured out by luck and with a great deal of caution, but much of it remained a mystery. Initially we had an electrical inspector come out very early in the project. He installed a meter and reviewed the system as a whole, providing general information and checking it for safety. What we needed to do on our own was to thoroughly understand the electrical breaker box. We had no idea which breaker powered which areas!

From the attic, the cellar and by looking through some access holes, we could see wires and wires, in what was basically a confusing spider web system. There were wires to knob and tubing, full run circuits that doubled back to make a loop, some running to lights and then to switches, some running to switches and then to lights, wiring coming from the attic going down, wiring coming from the cellar going up and many wires that we followed ran to nowhere; they were simply cut along the route yet left hanging.

In looking at the electric panel labels, the room titles listed we didn’t recognize. We saw the kitchen and dining room and understood it. Yet the other rooms were confusing. Oh we’d heard of the room names, but which one was which? We weren’t comfortable to just start flipping switches and see what happened when we have one room we call the “burned out” room (you can guess what it looked like) and another with a serious leak and wiring in the middle of it. We need to keep the circuits off for these rooms.

We decided to read up on the rooms to help orient ourselves. We learned these rooms are called in general, Day Rooms. To give a little history, and it’s quite interesting really (and you will recognize this in any period era movies or shows), in early American/Victorian style homes, they usually had many rooms; each with a specific use and name. To name a few I’m sure you’ve heard of the parlor, the sitting room, the drawing room, the gentleman’s room, boudoir, study and so on.

One of the electric panel labels indicated a parlor, a library and a ball room! Well, I think we all know what room was the ball room (ours is not as large but it is obvious), so we had figured out 1! That gave us a starting point.

A quick explanation of a few of the rooms: entryways were meant to be grand, as it was seen by all entering the home. It was the place to show off. The largest chandeliers and some of the most woodwork is frequently found here (i.e. grand staircases, etc…).

The parlor was very specific; it was where guests were collected and asked to wait for the people of the house to come and meet them. Then they could possibly do light conversation but nothing in depth. This was a brief visit and that’s the reason there is scant furniture here and it wasn’t necessarily the most comfortable (the chairs, although very beautiful might be stiff with a small table).

For more in depth business meetings, the guest was taken to the gentlemen’s room or the library. The drawing room was where you would “with”draw with family for a quiet evening, or even a close guest (in today’s world, the den or living room).

And we found out why there were these 2 room sets throughout! You see, sitting rooms were frequently connected to bedrooms. These offered a small room for just that, a private place for each person for relaxing, reading, etc…and typically had a fireplace, before retiring to bed. I could go on but you get the idea. Fun stuff!

Using this new knowledge, we spent a day chasing wires, flipping switches and now we feel as through we know pretty well which room the electric panel refers to! This means we can understand what is happening and safely know how to start the unraveling of it all. Progress!