Maid's Room

Maids rooms are typically small to very small. Think a twin bed and a dresser and that is typically what you can put in them. The bathrooms, which are typically en suite, have small sinks and either a shower (no tub) or a half tub. This is not to say that you can't find maids rooms that are larger than the norm, but most of the time they are very very small.

As far as having a window, any legal bedroom must have a window, so yes, the maids room must have a window. But along the same lines of the size of the room, the maids room typically doesn't have a great view (air shaft, facing a wall, etc).

For my experience, few people these days have live in help like they did when maids rooms were being built. So the maids room typically become one of the older kids rooms in a family since it affords them a little more privacy considering the distance to the master and tends to have direct kitchen access (which when you are 16 is pretty darn nice).

(Matthew Russell - Brown Harris Stevens)

300_mercer, keep in mind that there's a huge difference between the "typical" size of a maid's room in a prewar layout (most of which are never used as maid's rooms) and the "typical" size of a maid's room in a modern layout that is actually occupied by a maid.

Back in the days of wine and roses, before the notion of minimum wage and law protecting workers, domestic help was treated like appliances: always expected to be "on" when needed, and simply "put away" after use. People who went "into service" understood that it was a vocation, not too much different from entering the convent or monastery; as a domestic servant, you were to have no identity of your own, no life of your own, because your "life" was dedicated to the service of your employer, period. If you were paid wages at all, they were minimal; the bulk of your compensation was merely your room and board. Workdays were often 12, 14, 16, even 18 hours or longer -- depending on how early your masters rose, and how late they retired. It was expected that you remain at their beck and call every of THEIR waking hours, that you arose in the morning well before they did (breakfast hot, coffee brewed, flowers fresh cut, newspaper crisp) and retired well after they did (someone had to turn down the lights after climbing into a warm bed, and it certainly wasn't going to be the master of the house!).

As a result, domestic servants had no real need for spacious quarters, since they had very little free time to themselves anyway. Therefore, a twin bed in a 6x8 cell (excuse me -- ROOM) with a toilet and shower was more than sufficient.

100 years later, things are different. Domestic help is expected to be paid wages in addition to room and board. There's this thing called the 8-hour workday. Domestics aren't expected to devote their lives to their employers, so they actually HAVE lives outside of work.

I cannot imagine employing a full-time live-in staffer (whether you call him or her a maid, housekeeper, butler, assistant, or whatever) and not providing them with at least a full bath, bedroom, and small sitting room. Or a nice-sized "studio" apartment within the apartment (at least 17x12 room).

Lots of people have live in nannies. Where do they stay?

Thanks. We are thinking 12*6 interior room which at 72 sq ft is in line with what we saw in many pre-war layouts except that many of the prewars have a window albeit facing the shaft or another wall. Any thoughts? Is having a window in the maid's room a legal requirement?

Besides the window mentioned above, to be legally habitable a bedroom has minimum square footage and dimension requirements. I think it's 70 ft² and 7' in the shortest dimension, but your architect will let you know.

I suppose a tiny windowless room might attract someone right off the plane from someplace where mud huts are standard, but who else would put up with it? At first sight it says how you intend to treat them.

Current maid/nanny rooms run at least 10'x10', e.g. in the full floors at 535 WEA.

I think NWT makes a very good point. The accomodations you are offering to your help speaks very loudly about how you intend to treat them. Put yourself in THEIR place. You wouldn't want room for a little desk, a comfortable chair, a small bookcase?

I am looking for a condo with a maid's room - NOT for a maid but to have a place for my cats' 3 litter boxes, to store their food, litter, mops, brooms etc - maybe an ironing board I could leave UP? Can't find it - anyone know of any? Thanks in advance. Must be no higher up in Manhattan than the
mid 80's and not East of Lexington. Double thanks.