Thank you to a customer who was kind enough to share this grand old tradition of sleeping outside on a screened in porch .
Iron beds on porches were not uncommon during the Victorian era. The homes were designed specifically with areas for beds. Why……because of the hot humid nights during the summer months. There was no air conditioning and people quite often moved the bed they had in the bedrooms out on to the cool porch that was able to take advantage of the cool night breeze. Because iron beds presented a “light” airy look to start out with, few other forms of bed frames ever worked as well or looked as good as the traditional metal bed. Once again they elevated the occupant off the floor and away from and rodents or unwanted creepy crawlers.
Antique iron beds also were easily disassembled when the time came to move them back inside.
It was a definite sign of privilege and affluence when a homeowner had beds for the Sleeping Porch and also beds for the individual bedrooms throughout the house.
One of my fondest memories, visiting my grandmother in Pennsylvania, was spending the night in a metal bed on her sleeping porch with all my cousins. We’d tell ghost stories and try to scare each other, until we all ended up in the sturdiest of her beds and all fell asleep.
This photo brought back very fond memories.
