Salon

A Reading in the Salon of Mme Geoffrin, 1755
Wikipedia - "A salon is a gathering of people under the roof of an inspiring host, held partly to amuse one another and partly to refine the taste and increase the knowledge of the participants through conversation. These gatherings often consciously followed Horace's definition of the aims of poetry, 'either to please or to educate' (Latin: aut delectare aut prodesse). Salons, commonly associated with French literary and philosophical movements of the 17th and 18th centuries, were carried on until as recently as the 1940s in urban settings. The salon was an Italian invention of the 16th century, which flourished in France throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. The salon continued to flourish in Italy throughout the 19th century. In 16th-century Italy, some brilliant circles formed in the smaller courts which resembled salons, often galvanized by the presence of a beautiful and educated patroness such as Isabella d'Este or Elisabetta Gonzaga. ..."
Wikipedia
Salon Culture: Network of Ideas
The History and Meaning of Salons
A Renaissance of Salon Culture
Women's Involvement in the French Salons (Early 18th Century)
Getty Center - Comic Art: The Paris Salon in Caricature
[PDF] Shaping the Public Sphere: English Coffeehouses and French Salons and the Age of the Enlightenment