Craster and Seahouses: "Having a Kip" Alongside Seahouses, the fishing village of Craster was once the kipper capital of England, smoking over 25,000 fish a day in the early part of this century.
The fish were gutted by Scottish fishwives who lived in ramshackle buildings, called "Kip Houses", which were only suitable for sleeping in. Hence, having a kip!
Possibly came from the Danish meaning a cheap tavern or alehouse. In the 1880's kips were beds and there were 'kip houses' and brothels may have been described as 'kip shops'!
'Kip' - from the Dutch word 'kippe' - meant a low quality drinking-house or brothel from the early 1700s. In the next century, it also took on the idea of low quality lodgings...a doss-house, in effect. From there, it developed further to mean either a bed or a sleep, by the middle of the 19th century.