Anyway, I\u2019m pleased to announce that we are about to answer one of the most universally pondered questions there is\u2026 what does the WC toilet sign really stand for?\n
\n
So, while most of us are equipped with the more traditional abbreviations, such as LOL, WTF and LMAO, some are a little harder to decipher.\n
People Were Left Stunned After Finally Learning What \u2018WC Toilet Sign Stands For
\nTake WC, for example, which often appears on toilet doors.\n
But the room itself is usually referred to as a \u2018bathroom\u2019 or \u2018restroom\u2019, so what does WC stand for?\n
It turns out those two letters stand for \u2018water closet\u2019, and that there\u2019s also a perfectly good reason behind the name.\n
It all stems from a time when indoor plumbing became a thing after centuries of popping outside to spend a penny.\n
As bathtubs were already an indoor fixture in homes, they had a dedicated room \u2013 the bathroom, of course.\n
But people needed somewhere for their brand new, shiny indoor toilet to go.\n
After someone asked TikToker Nathan (@itsnathannyc) about the term, he explained in a video: \u201cOh, you sweet young thing! WC stands for \u2018water closet\u2019.\n
\n
\u201cBefore indoor plumbing, you actually had a room for your bathtub \u2013 the bathroom.\n
\u201cBut the spout was outside. You had to carry water in with a bucket, heat it up, pour it in the tub.\n
\u201cIndoor plumbing comes along \u2013 they already have this room with the bath, the bathroom\u2026 Where do you put the toilet?\n
\u201cYou just put it in a closet. It was an easy place to put a toilet. So: the water closet.\n
\u201cIt was the one room in the house where there was running water.\u201d\n
Many other TikTokers admitted they\u2019d never realised what WC stood for, or why, with one person commenting: \u201cI\u2019m glad someone asked because I\u2019ve been wondering about this for years but never googled it.\u201d\n
Someone else said: \u201cI never actually thought about this.\u201d\n
And another added: \u201cI was 23 y\/o when I learned that WC is called a water closet.\u201d\n
While the fourth piped up to say: \u201cCan\u2019t believe I\u2019ve been living with a WC sign and had no idea why it was called WC.\u201d\n
For any history buffs reading this, here\u2019s a more detailed account of how the humble water closet came to be.\n
\n
Old House Online states: \u201cIn the 1870s, most folks did their business\u2014as infrequently as possible\u2014in two ways: in a hole in the ground, or in a chamber pot (often concealed in a \u2018commode,\u2019 \u2018cabinet chair,\u2019 or box-like \u2018close stool\u2019). A \u2018toilet\u2019 was just a dressing table or washstand, a meaning that eventually got flushed away when water closets adopted the moniker.\n
\u201cIn the 1880s, the earliest flushing water closets were made to resemble familiar chamber pots and commodes. However, it wasn\u2019t long before folks discovered that wood, water, and other (ahem) stuff didn\u2019t mix. Those great bathroom suites of Gilded Age mansions were heaven to behold, but hell to maintain, and by the late 1880s, \u201copen plumbing\u201d was coming into vogue, with porcelain fixtures in full view.\u201d\n
So, while the old, cramped and closeted style of the water closet didn\u2019t remain, and transformed over time into the spacious, tiled bathrooms we enjoy today, the phrase \u2018water closet\u2019 has stuck and remains on signage worldwide to this day.\n
Learn something new everyday, right?\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We\u2019ve all seen signs for the toilets in a public place and noticed the initials WC, but do any of us actually know what it stands for? There are many questions in life that often go unanswered, such as where on earth those missing socks go or why do pizzas arrive in square boxes? Or\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":86320,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[670],"tags":[693],"class_list":{"0":"post-86248","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-news"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/WC-sign-1.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86248"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86248\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86335,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86248\/revisions\/86335"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86320"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/justmetalking.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}