washbasin

US/ˈwɑʃˌbeɪsən/

nounC1Very rare — outside the 30,000 commonest English words, so you will meet it in writing rather than in speechleans spoken

Other forms: washbasins

A washbasin is the bathroom bowl with taps where you rinse your hands. Below the mirror, above the pedestal.

British English says basin or sink, and plumbers distinguish them, since a basin is for washing people and a sink is for washing things. American English says sink for both. The pedestal hides the pipes and a wall-hung basin does not. There is a real difference in tap arrangement between countries, since separate hot and cold taps remain a British peculiarity nobody else understands.

Definitions of washbasin

1nounwashbasinA bowl with taps, used for washing the hands and face.C1
“The washbasin was cracked right across.”

Also accepted in games: sink, basin

Where it comes from

From wash + basin.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 25 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word

washbasin in the wild

Entering from Shakespeare Street, a committee room is to the right, while to the left a passageway leads past a screened washbasin to a door to the stairwell.
Ruchill Church Hall
The Shah's mother's special washbasin and basin were made of jewel-encrusted gold, and the other washbasins were made of enameled silver.
Malek Jahan Khanom
The Hotel de Paris had indoor plumbing with a washbasin in each room, as well as electric lighting which replaced gas lighting in 1893.
Adolphe Gérard

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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