What do you call this?

**Vela** · 02-17-2007, 11:38 AM

I call mine a couch, but salespeople call them sofas because it sounds more "rich" and proper. It's really just a play on words, sofa is more proper while couch is "slang", at least on sales floor.

**DrKym** · 02-17-2007, 11:43 AM

It is a nap place!
We call it a couch, altough my father in law calls them davenports also

Maybe it is a Kansas thing? I never heard them called that, although a SOFA is what you are not allowed to sit on until you are 30 in when we were growing up. It was what the adults sat on

(looked like a white couch to us!)

**BC_MoM** · 02-17-2007, 11:47 AM

I call that a chesterfield!

**Twisterdog** · 02-17-2007, 11:56 AM

I call it a couch.

My parents called it a couch, and we had a big, ugly orange and white velveteen one growing up, that all our friends and us sat on, jumped on the cushions and watched TV on.

However, my grandparents did not have a "couch" they had a "sofa" or a "davenport". We would no more have sat on those things than we would have thrown oatmeal on the carpet.

Perhaps it's a level of formality, perhaps it's generational.

**Killearn Kitties** · 02-17-2007, 11:56 AM

I would call it a couch, sofa, or settee. I don't think of one word as being more up-market than another, but sales people will always try to avoid negative connotations.

**Freckles** · 02-17-2007, 11:58 AM

Davenport.

**Pam** · 02-17-2007, 12:16 PM

Maybe it is a regional thing or a generational thing. I call it a sofa but my mother (quite elderly) would call it a davenport.

**Randi** · 02-17-2007, 12:19 PM

I would call it a sofa here, but probably a couch in USA. I actually thought couch was the translation of sofa. I think more British people would say settee.

Actually, I wonder where the word sofa originates from - I haven't checked.

This is a Chesterfield:
http://www.alltheweb.com/search?cat=...&_sb_lang=pref

**Craftlady** · 02-17-2007, 01:06 PM

Davenport, Couch, Sofa all three names I've used. Davenport maybe a generation thing but then again I'm NOT old.

and call a couch a davenport. I'm also from NE Ohio not sure it's a regional thing.
If I was going into a store, I would call it a sofa to the sales person since that seems to get the point across what your looking to buy.

**lizbud** · 02-17-2007, 01:25 PM

I would call it a couch, although I am aware stores refer to them as sofas.

**gemini9961** · 02-17-2007, 01:27 PM

Like I said before it's a couch to me. I have never heard of it being called a Davenport or the other names mentioned. Anything I sit my butt down on after a long day or to watch TV is a couch, unless of course it's a chair.

On a side note, I had no idea there were so many different names. I use couch and have heard sofa but that's all.

**sparks19** · 02-18-2007, 01:19 PM

It's a couch

**Suki Wingy** · 02-18-2007, 05:37 PM

that is a couch!

**cassiesmom** · 02-18-2007, 08:04 PM

It's a sofa. Either it's going in the front room (which people not from Chicago call a living room) or the family room (formerly known as the den). Unless it only seats two people, and then it's a love seat. I like it, by the way and I need a new one in the worst way - I will have to find out if there's a Laz-boy store in Chicagoland.