noun
- buildings or rooms equipped with facilities for washing clothes, typically shared by multiple households
Usage: historical; British English
Examples
- The old washhouses behind the tenement buildings were demolished in the 1960s.
- Residents would gather at the communal washhouses every Monday morning.
- The Victorian washhouses had large stone sinks and copper boilers.
- Many working-class neighborhoods had shared washhouses before modern appliances.
- The council converted the abandoned washhouses into community centers.
- Women would socialize while doing laundry at the neighborhood washhouses.