parlor

American  

[pahr-ler] / ˈpɑr lər /

especially British, parlour

noun

• parlors
  plural

1. Older Use. a room for the reception and entertainment of visitors to one's home; living room.

2. a room, apartment, or building serving as a place of business for certain businesses or professions.

   funeral parlor; beauty parlor.

3. a somewhat private room in a hotel, club, or the like for relaxation, conversation, etc.; lounge.

4. Also called locutorium. a room in a monastery or the like where the inhabitants may converse with visitors or with each other.

---

adjective

1. advocating something, as a political view or doctrine, at a safe remove from actual involvement in or commitment to action.

   parlor leftism; parlor pink.

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• parlors
  plural

Etymology

Origin of parlor

1175–1225; Middle English parlur < Anglo-French; Old French parleor, equivalent to parl ( er ) to speak ( see parle) + -eor -or ²

Explanation

A parlor is a living room or a sitting room, the place in your house with comfortable chairs and sofas. You might also decide to put your giant new TV in the parlor. The noun parlor is an old-fashioned one. Still, almost anyone would know what you meant if you invited them to join you in the parlor for tea. These days, a hotel, inn, or historic house is more likely to have a parlor than a private home is. The thirteenth century version, parlur, meant "room in a monastery for holding conversations." The "conversations" part stems from parler, "to speak" in French.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

parlor parlors

Bruna Subashi, an energetic woman in her 40s, asked to convene in a luridly pink dessert parlor on Vlore’s waterfront called Big Scoop.

From Slate ● Sep. 8, 2026

The charge was eventually dropped after a court ruled that video and audio from secretly installed cameras at the massage parlor could not be used as evidence.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 27, 2026

Often I’d sign on to read the takes of sharp commenters over the writers who provided the digital parlor.

From Salon ● Aug. 23, 2026

Mercedes Cabrera Lafaro was hoping to reopen her beauty parlor now that the large groups of young men were no longer roaming the streets.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 2, 2026

The newly built house had three floors, at least seven rooms, and a balcony that overlooked a fine parlor.

From "American Spirits" by Barb Rosenstock

Tidy general stores, ice cream parlors and a Main Street lined with striped awnings.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 9, 2026

McAfee said he tests every batch of milk that comes out of his milking parlors, and none have been positive for E. coli, salmonella, campylobacter, listeria or any other contaminant that causes human illness.

From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 2, 2026

Investments in precision technologies such as robotic milking systems, rotary parlors and wearable health and reproductive technologies can help reduce labor costs across farms.

From Salon ● Sep. 16, 2024

Her paintings are set amid the privileged spaces of 19th-century parlors and gardens, where women sew or read or nurse an infant, uninterrupted by men.

From New York Times ● May 16, 2024

Sleazy bars, store-front churches with gospels being shouted inside, “bargain” stores, hockshops, undertaking parlors.

From "The Autobiography of Malcolm X" by Alex Malcolm X;Hailey

Related Words

• drawing room
• living room
• lounge
• salon