I've been researching Old West brothels for almost a year to write a novel. I can't find an answer to this, except for the Chinese women forced to work in California or "crib girls".
Because women in most modern first-world brothels go home to their own beds when their shifts are over, I assumed that was true for brothels in the Old West. But some sources have led me to believe that the working women essentially lived in their places of business.
However, I can't find anything about their lives in the brothel while they weren't working. Did they have a space of their own, or a place to sleep/ rest outside of the places they invited customers? If they had their own bed, was this the same bed they worked, or did they women just use whatever bed was available?
Additional questions, if anyone knows: Where did they eat? When did they do their hair and makeup? Did they do their own laundry, or have it sent out?
I understand that there were many different types of prostitutes in the Old West, and "crib girls" "camp girls" almost always had a designated cot or tent respectively. But I'm mainly interested in brothel and parlor workers, specifically in Denver, circ. 1895-1905. Of course, I'm happy for any information that doesn't exactly match that strict criteria!
Thanks for any advice, or any reading material you can recommend.
Brothels of the period were usually arranged like a boarding house - the facility had a number of bedrooms, a parlor and a kitchen/dining area (which were usually separate). There could be a privy outback, but depending on the place, there could be indoor plumbing (rare earlier, more common later) The parlor would be used for greeting guests and for general entertainment (drinks, music, conversation, etc.). Each woman's bedroom was also the place of sexual commerce - so yes, that part of the work was accomplished in the place where the woman slept (and that is where they would manage all aspects of their appearance except for major bathing).
Brothels often had an in-house cook and they provided meals much like a boarding house (as opposed to a lodging house, where renters handled their own meals). Cribs showed a spectrum of possibilities: some were large enough to include a kitchen; others had no kitchen facility, requiring the woman to go out for all substantial meals.
Laundry would be handled in different ways. I have never seen a brothel described in census records with an in-house laundry worker, but there was often a woman who handled aspects of the running of the establishment, so it is not impossible to imagine such a person doing laundry. Otherwise, most communities had laundries available in neighborhoods, so it would be easy enough to purchase those services.