usage of "floor" and "storey"
YoongFook
Is it true that ...
ground floor = 1st floor = 1st storey and
2nd floor = 2nd storey
or
ground floor = 1st storey and
1st floor = 2nd storey..
Please help...
Serenleono
>Is it true that ...
>
>ground floor = 1st floor = 1st storey and
>2nd floor = 2nd storey
> or
>ground floor = 1st storey and
>1st floor = 2nd storey.
That depends upon where the building is located.
BRITISH USAGE:
Ground floor = lowest floor, at street level,
also called street floor or main floor.
First floor = the next floor up.
Second storey (also spelled story) = the next storey above the ground
floor.
roof
---------------------------
third storey
second floor
---------------------------
second storey
first floor
----------------------------
first storey
ground floor
---------------------------- street level
U.S. USAGE:
First floor = lowest floor, at street level,
also called street floor, bottom floor, main floor,
or ground floor.
Second floor = the next floor above the first (ground) floor.
Second storey (story) = the story next above the first (ground) floor.
roof
---------------------------
third storey
third floor
---------------------------
second storey
second floor
----------------------------
first storey
first floor
---------------------------- street level
Seren
JUST AN H
the architectural word "storey."
In the States, "storey" means "floor," but that word is generally used when
referring to the total number of floors in a building. I.E., "The Norwest
building is 75 stories tall." (or "high".) When one steps into an elevator
however, one presses the button for his/her "floor." In my case, I work on the
26th floor of our building downtown, and live on the seventh floor of my
building here on Capitol Hill.
As for the first floor, well, it depends on which building you're in. (In
France, the first floor of any building is called the "rez d'chausee." ("street
level") Very cut and dried, but no such luck in America) In America, the name
for the first floor varies from building to building and from architect to
architect. Some buildings refer to the first floor simply as "1." Others
refer to it as "Lobby", "Street," "Concourse" (say what??!!), "G" (for
"ground"), "S" for "Street," and other annoying contrivances.
Serenleono
>Sorry, but "story" in the States still means a tale, and is not a
>variation of the architectural word "storey."
I consider you a reliable source, but are you quite certain in this?
Mind you, I'm British-born, so I'm no expert on American usage -- in
fact, I've spelled the word s-t-o-r-e-y all my life, -- but both
Webster 3 (MW3NID, unabridged) and RHWCD(1991) list storey as a
*variant* of story, and not the other way about, leading me to believe
that story is the standard American spelling.
>In France, the first floor of any building is called the "rez d'chausee."
And the equivalent of *rez-de-chaussée* in Italian is *pianterréno*
(usually shortened to just *terréno*). The real confusion, however,
isn't with the ground floor, but with the naming of the next floor up.
To the British, French, Spanish, and Italian peoples it is the first
floor (but second storey). (My French and Spanish are regrettably
miserable, but I believe it's called the *premier étage* and *primer
piso*, respectively, in those languages. My Italian is better; in
Italy it is called *primo piano*.) To most Americans, on the other
hand -- at least as I have observed during my years in the States, --
the next floor up from the ground level is invariably called the
second floor (corresponding quite logically with the second storey).
This divergence between American and European usage confuses most
first-time visitors to the United States at least for a while. I've
become used to it at last, but it wasn't easy to adjust. I think
"storey" and say "floor", and this works for me.
--
Seren
La Serenleono (the Serene Lion)
JUST AN H
and found that "storey" is a perfectly acceptable word for "floor" in the
States. I should have checked before I posted that message. My apologies.
Bill McCray
wrote:
>jus...@aol.com (JUST AN H) scripsit:
>
>>Sorry, but "story" in the States still means a tale, and is not a
>>variation of the architectural word "storey."
>
>I consider you a reliable source, but are you quite certain in this?
>Mind you, I'm British-born, so I'm no expert on American usage -- in
>fact, I've spelled the word s-t-o-r-e-y all my life, -- but both
>Webster 3 (MW3NID, unabridged) and RHWCD(1991) list storey as a
>*variant* of story, and not the other way about, leading me to believe
>that story is the standard American spelling.
>
"Story" is the spelling I've seen all my life for either a tale or a
floor of a building. "Storey" looks like a "mispeling". Yes, I'm in
the U.S.
Bill McCray
Lexington, KY
Alex R. Cohen
<199808060222...@ladder01.news.aol.com>...
>Sorry, but "story" in the States still means a tale, and is not a variation
of
>the architectural word "storey."
Sorry, but "storey" in the American Heritage Dictionary of the English
Language, 3d Edition, is a "Chiefly British" variation of "story," sense 2.
>In the States, "storey" means "floor," but that word is generally used when
>referring to the total number of floors in a building. I.E., "The Norwest
>building is 75 stories tall." (or "high".) When one steps into an elevator
>however, one presses the button for his/her "floor." In my case, I work on
the
>26th floor of our building downtown, and live on the seventh floor of my
>building here on Capitol Hill.
Which Capitol Hill?
Are there actually 75-story, or even 26-story, buildings in the District of
Columbia? In Alexandria, perhaps, but the District? Isn't the legal ceiling
about eight stories?
-Alex R. Cohen
Daniel James
> To the British, French, Spanish, and Italian peoples it is the first
> floor (but second storey).
>
Really? I've never thought of calling the first floor the second
storey - but perhaps people do. When someone tells me that they live on
the third storey of a five storey block I go looking for them on the
third floor - it seems to work. There is a difference in the customary
usage of the two words, we talk about a ten-storey building but of the
thirrd floor of a building. To say "a ten-floor building" would
definitely be eccentric, if not wrong; to say "a room on the third
storey" would be unusual, but I think it would mean the same as "a room
on the third floor". Unfortunately all the references I have to hand
resolutely refuse to give an example of this usage.
In (European) Spanish, incidentally, the ground floor is the /planta
baja/ and the first floor is (as you say) the /primer piso/ or /primera
planta/. I believe that Latin American usage follows American English
usage in calling the ground floor the /primer piso/ - is that right?
Cheers,
Daniel James
JUST AN H
as the 1st floor) is called the "rez-de-chausee." Numbering of floors begins
above the rez-de-chausee, so a five-storey building in France would be numbered
thusly: Rez-de-chausee (ground floor), premiere etage (first floor), deuxieme
etage (second floor), troisieme etage (third floor) and quatrieme etage
(fourth floor).
In short, the second floor of a French building is referred to as the first
floor, the the third as the second, and so forth.
Robert Cort
<tob...@mis.net> writes
>On Fri, 07 Aug 1998 06:16:04 GMT, ve...@mindspring.com (Serenleono)
>wrote:
>
> >jus...@aol.com (JUST AN H) scripsit:
> >
> >>variation of the architectural word "storey."
> >
> >Mind you, I'm British-born, so I'm no expert on American usage -- in
> >fact, I've spelled the word s-t-o-r-e-y all my life, -- but both
> >Webster 3 (MW3NID, unabridged) and RHWCD(1991) list storey as a
> >*variant* of story, and not the other way about, leading me to believe
> >that story is the standard American spelling.
> >
>"Story" is the spelling I've seen all my life for either a tale or a
>floor of a building. "Storey" looks like a "mispeling". Yes, I'm in
>the U.S.
>
>Bill McCray
>Lexington, KY
According to Concise Oxford English Dictionary (9th edition)
"storey (US. also story) 1. any of the parts into which a building is
divided horizontally...
[Middle English from Anglo-Latin historia HISTORY (perhaps originally
meaning a tier of painted windows or a sculpture]
"story an acccount of imaginary or past events, an anecdote etc. [Middle
English storie via Anglo-French estorie (Old French estoire) from Latin
historia]
story (as 2nd meaning) US variation of storey"
There it would appear to rest, with honour on both sides as to origin
satisfied.
Robert Cort
Chiddingstone Hoath, England
>
--
Robert Cort
Bill Kinkaid
>
>Sorry, but "storey" in the American Heritage Dictionary of the English
>Language, 3d Edition, is a "Chiefly British" variation of "story," sense 2.
>
Where DID they get that expression, which ignores the English-speaking
populations of Canada, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa,
India, and various other *former* British possessions in Asia, Africa, and
the Caribbean, all of which generally follow spelling conventions which
American dictionaries arrogantly describe as "Chiefly British"?
After all, do British dictionaries say that spellings like "color" and
"center" are "Chiefly American"?
Bill in Vancouver
(delete EAT-SPAM-AND-DIE
from e-mail address to respond)
Robert Cort
Concise Oxford Dictionary (9th edition) simply refers to color and
center as US variant
"Robert Cort, <rober...@whitepost.demon.co.uk>
In article <35cfc5e4....@news.bctel.ca>, Bill Kinkaid <kinkaid@eat
.spam.and.die.bc.sympatico.ca> writes
janelaw
>
>
> Where DID they get that expression, which ignores the English-speaking
> populations of Canada, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa,
> India, and various other *former* British possessions in Asia, Africa, and
> the Caribbean, all of which generally follow spelling conventions which
> American dictionaries arrogantly describe as "Chiefly British"?
>
> After all, do British dictionaries say that spellings like "color" and
> "center" are "Chiefly American"?
>
> Bill in Vancouver
>
What do they say?
Daniel James
wrote:
> In French, ...
>
Yes, I know that. I was picking up Serenleono's assertion that "To the
British, French, Spanish, and Italian peoples it is the first floor
(but second storey)".
As a British person I have always considered that the "first floor" and
"first storey" were one and the same (i.e. the first floor above the
ground floor) - I'd be interested to hear whether anyone else disagrees
with me.
In fact I would probably not use "storey" in this sense at all. That
is: I would talk of "a ten storey building", but not of "the tenth
storey"; and I would talk of "the tenth floor", but not of "a ten floor
building".
Cheers,
Daniel James
Serenleono
>As a British person I have always considered that the "first floor" and
>"first storey" were one and the same (i.e. the first floor above the
>ground floor) - I'd be interested to hear whether anyone else disagrees
>with me.
Interesting. But a three-storey building in Britain has how many
floors? I'd answer "three: a ground floor, first floor, and second
floor".
>In fact I would probably not use "storey" in this sense at all.
Neither would I. Technically, a storey is the space *between* two
floors, or a floor and the roof. If someone asked where a certain
person lived, I'd answer, "On the __d/th floor" and never "On the
__d/th storey", but you have to remember that the original question
asked by YoongFook (no doubt a Scottish name <g>) was:
Is it true that ...
ground floor = 1st floor = 1st storey and
2nd floor = 2nd storey
or
ground floor = 1st storey and
1st floor = 2nd storey..
I was trying to answer his/her question by using both terms. I still
believe I'm right, but I certainly don't mind being corrected when I'm
wrong.
Seren
Daniel James
> But a three-storey building in Britain has how many
> floors? I'd answer "three: ...
>
So would I.
> Technically, a storey is the space *between* two
> floors, or a floor and the roof.
>
.. or the ground and a floor, of course. I agree, but I don't think any
of us are being that technical here.
> If someone asked where a certain
> person lived, I'd answer, "On the __d/th floor" and never "On the
> __d/th storey", ...
>
I'm with you there, but in your original answer
(35d0df30....@news.mindspring.com) to YoongFook (yes, I do
remember) you put
> BRITISH USAGE:
> Ground floor = lowest floor, at street level,
> also called street floor or main floor.
> First floor = the next floor up.
>
> Second storey (also spelled story) = the next storey above the ground
> floor.
>
> roof
> ---------------------------
> third storey
> second floor
> ---------------------------
> second storey
> first floor
> ----------------------------
> first storey
> ground floor
> ---------------------------- street level
>
which led me to believe that you /would/ say things like "On the __d/th
storey" (which I wouldn't, but can live with) and that you understand
British usage to equate "first floor" and "second storey" (which
surprised me).
> I still
> believe I'm right, but I certainly don't mind being corrected when I'm
> wrong.
>
I'm, not saying you're wrong, I'm just investigating a possibility for
ambiguity and confusion (i.e. my having got it wrong). It would never
occur to me to say "On the __d/th storey" (rather than floor), so I'm
not absolutely sure which floor I would understand that to mean. My
first instinct is to say "first floor = first storey" but the idea of
calling anything the "ground storey" leaves me cold!
Cheers,
Daniel James
sohail2...@gmail.com
> Can anyone help me with the definition of "floor" and "storey"...
>
>
> ground floor = 1st floor = 1st storey and
> 2nd floor = 2nd storey
>
> or
>
> ground floor = 1st storey and
> 1st floor = 2nd storey..
>
Phil Hobbs
in Quebec, where ground floor = rez de chausee, second floor = premier
'etage, etc.
In England, IIRC, they use the French convention, where the first floor
is upstairs from the ground floor.
Cheers
Phil Hobbs