Quote:
Originally Posted by cromag
Oh, and for me, a "lounge" is a "bar" -- especially a somewhat seedy bar out of a '50s era noir paperback.
|
cromag, that place definitely looked seedy.
I can think of lounge describing many different places: bars (as you mentioned), departure lounges at airports, lounge rooms in homes, lounge cars on trains, and also sometimes refers to the public waiting area in hotels and similar.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jessica Lares
I don't mind as long as it's consistent. Don't call it a sofa on one page, a couch on the next. I've heard all of them used.
|
I had assumed that most most readers would be fine, would - as you say - have heard them all used, but it's looking like lounge (as a piece of furniture) simply isn't that familiar to some, and so the word raises associations that don't make sense in context.
Quote:
Originally Posted by davidfor
I think of it as a lounge. And that we bought a "lounge suite". They were put in the lounge room. Well, lounge/dining room.[...]
|
I am glad it hasn't turned out that it's just me.
Mostly I see the names I listed in the subject line as synonyms, but if pushed to it, and given no other context to the words, I would describe the various furniture as:
couch = a less formal/luxurious 2+ seater, probably with fairly firm back, firm or rigid (often wooden) arms. Intended for seating multiple people, not for smooching (or not comfortably).
lounge = a formal/luxurious 3+ seater with plush cushioning on back, seat and arms. Big enough to lie down on, and no sharp corners, making it very suitable for smooching.
sofa = a 2 seater lounge, too short to stretch out on comfortably, but here "sofa" often suggests "sofa-bed", so I would not be surprised to learn that it folds out into a bed (which could solve the smooching problem).
settee = a 2 seater lounge designed for looks rather than comfort.
Not sure where the smooching fixation came from, maybe I'd better go and lie down.
... Actually I do know, one of the scenes in question has a couple stretching out to smooch on the lounge; the "sofa" I see in my head just isn't big enough for that, it needs to be a "lounge".
But, since others have different associations to these words, I am left wondering how best to describe the scene so that I don't get half the people wondering what I'm talking about, and the other half thinking their legs are dangling off the end of the sofa (though maybe that aspect doesn't matter so much).