Why do old houses have bathrooms right next to the kitchen?

Question

Why do old houses have bathrooms right next to the kitchen?

Answer 1

probably made it easier on the piping/plumbing

Answer 2

Well in our old house (we live in the Uk, there would have not been a bathroom built inside, they would have had a tin bath out side which would have been brough in once a week to bath everyone in front of the fire.

The toilet would also have been outside.

The bathroom would have been built as an extention and if they are like our house which only has two bedrooms that is why the bathroom is downstairs, simply no room to put it upstairs!

Answer 3

Because. Actually most of those houses were not designed to have indoor plumbing, and the bathroom of some of them was added to the exterior. The people back then were usually more practical then stylish, unless you include the rich minority, and it just made sense to keep the pipes short as possible.

Answer 4

if it's a half bath, they usually were used by the help so that cooks/butlers didn't have to go out into the entertaining area to use the facilities.

Answer 5

Most homes, old and new, try to save money on the piping costs. Shorter runs mean less cost. My 100 year old home had the bathroom on the second floor, right above the kitchen. New Codes made bathrooms be moved away from the kitchen for health reasons. Funny part was that most codes state that the bathroom door cannot be directly into the kitchen. This was taken care of by installing two doorways (but only one door) between the rooms.

Answer 6

Shorter pipes (and therefore less cost) was one reason.

Another reason ~ which is very common in our town for homes built prior to 1900 ~ is that most older houses used to have the kitchens in the back of the house, that opened directly onto a back porch. When bathrooms were later retrofitted into these older homes, it was that unused porch space that typically became the new bathroom.