The Unfinished Chamber
This plain, unheated room was probably a storage area and a sleeping chamber for the enslaved servants who worked in the household. An enslaved woman probably cared for the Van Cortlandt children, and her sleeping assignment across from the nursery would be near them during the night. When it was used for sleeping, the chamber was likely furnished with a very simple table and chair and a low bed or a grass mattress placed on the floor.
This room is referred to as the Unfinished Chamber because of the unfinished state of the walls. You can see that the framing of the house was left exposed in this room unlike others in the house that have been finished off with plaster or wood paneling. Rooms such as this one and the nursery would have been finished off as needed as the family or need for space grew.