Today, in language use I haven't noticed for far too long...

[deird1]

Does everyone in non-Australia seriously call them twin beds?

Twin? Really?

Single/double works so well. Twin/double is more... aren't they the same? It sounds weird.

I'm rather confused.

Comments

[beroli]

I think the idea is that they assume you're getting bed(s) for two people, so if you're getting one "twin" bed, you're getting two, thus twins. (Or at least, they'd rather sell you two than one.)

[petzipellepingo]

A bed that can fit one person is called a twin and people used to buy two of them for two siblings (twin or otherwise), a bed that could fit two people (this is years ago mind you) is called a double bed. There were no queen or king beds when all of this naming started.

[curiouswombat]

We currently have two, identical, single beds in our two, smallish, spare bedrooms. We hope to move house and will then put them side by side in one room as a spare bedroom - and at that point I will probably tell people that our spare bedroom has twin beds...

[petzipellepingo]

Best Friend has two twin beds put together for her and her husband because they have different mattress requirements. She uses queen sheets and blankets to cover both of them.

[velvetwhip]

I am so used to calling them twin beds... possibly because my sister and I had them and there were two of them and it made sense to me until you called it into question.


Gabrielle

[deird1]

I had that last year - and not by choice. Twas not fun. (Done for separate mattresses, though, that makes sense.)

[deird1]

Down here we have:
- single
- king single
- double
- queen
- king

...I really hadn't realised this wasn't universal.

[deird1]

It just seems odd that I'd be buying my only-child a "twin" bed...

[deird1]

See, that makes sense to me. It's the single bed, by itself, called a "twin" that baffles me.


(Also, happy birthday!)

[deird1]

it made sense to me until you called it into question

I think that's me for most language things. It all seems perfectly reasonable until I have to think about it. :)

[curiouswombat]

Thank you - and yes, that would baffle me a bit, too!

[curiouswombat]

It's odd the differences in language that means we seem to mean the same things - but don't, between the US, Australia, Canada and the UK.

In our word usage a queen sized sheet wouldn't fit a pair of twins as a single is 3feet wide - so two of them would be 6feet wide. But a king sized bed is only 5 feet wide - so a queen sized bed to me is a standard 4foot 6inch double!

[rebcake]

I am curious about this "king single". Smaller than a double?

Here in Cali, we have"

Twin
Twin XL (extra long, usually found in dorm rooms)
double (which is not double the size of a twin)
queen
king (aka Eastern or standard king)
California king (Western king, 4 inches longer and 4 inches narrower than a standard king)

[deird1]

King singles are wide single beds - but not really wide enough for two people unless there's some serious snuggling involved.

I've never really seen beds with extra length. That's interesting.

[deird1]

It's like the difficulties I have with American recipes. "1 cup" means a totally different size there...

[jesuswasbatman]

Speaking as a UK person, I refer to the items of furniture as "single beds". "Twin beds" is a phrase, used mostly in a hotel context, to refer to two separate single beds in the same room.

[charliefred.blogspot.com]

King singles are longer than singles. Queens and Kings are longer than Doubles and Singles, too. :)

Sue Ellen

[lizbee]

It's rare, but we also have a queen single.

I had a queen single waterbed as a kid (Mum got them cheap, and figured they'd be good for my arthritis), and while getting linen for it was a pain (I think we mostly made do with double-bed stuff), I still miss it. (The bladder died after about ten years, and replacing it would have cost more than buying a new double waterbed.)

[immer_am_lesen]

Odd. 'Single' makes much more sense, to me.

Single person = single bed. (though Double bed isn't *really* for two people, unless you really like cuddling all the time...)

Calling them 'twin' beds makes sense if you have two and are putting them side-by-side, as my parents do, so each has a mattress-hardness to suit personal needs. Otherwise, single all the way. :)

Laney says, "...whaaa?"

[(Anonymous)]

Seriously?
If I go and buy ONE bed for ONE person, that bed's called a TWIN?
Surely twin beds implies that there have to be two beds present?
I have three boys. It'd be ludicrous to call any one of them a twin unless they had arrived in a pair - no pair, not a twin. Isn't that what 'twin' MEANS?

[deird1]

IKR???

[deird1]

My thoughts exactly. :)

[deird1]

That's what I'd say, yes.