Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a bed (in a lodging house).

1885

Dly Gaz. for Middlesborough 6 Nov. 3/4: We stopped to look at another [lodging] house [...] the proprietor of which volunteered [...] that he was ‘full up’. ‘Not a bloomin’ kipsie (bed) to be had’.

2. (Aus.) a home, a house.

1894		Truth (Sydney) 14 Jan. 6/6: Archie leads him into Fanny’s kipsey (i.e., house) and they plays the old game on him.
1908		Bulletin (Sydney) 16 July 39/1: I spent me young days in the clover / Most joyfully ‘playin’ the wag. / I gev up the jolly old Kipsey, / An’ started to bein’ a gypsy, / Before I was out o’ me teens.
1916		C.J. Dennis ‘Duck an’ Fowl’ in Moods of Ginger Mick 18: Down in Rosie’s kipsie, at the end uv Spadger’s Lane.
1924		G.H. Lawson Dict. of Aus. Words And Terms 🌐 KIPSIE – A dwelling.
1940		H. Drake-Brockman Hot Gold III i: Let this kipsie. I’ll board for a bit.
1963		R. McGregor-Hastie Compleat Migrant 107: Kipsie: home.

3. (Aus.) a cheap lodging house.

1907		Sun. Times (Perth) 24 Mar. 1/1: A couple of visitors and a quartette of locals made a Chow kipsie hum.
1961		T. Ronan Only a Short Walk 3: I run a kipsie myself, mostly for sailors.
1984		Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 649/1: since ca. 1910.

4. (Aus.) a dugout, a shelter in WWI .

1919		W.H. Downing Digger Dialects 31: kippsie — Lean-to; shelter; house; dugout.
1924		(con. WWI) A.G. Pretty Gloss. of Sl. [...] in the A.I.F. 1921–1924 (rev. t/s) n.p.: kippsie. Lean-to, shelter, house, dugout.

5. (Aus.) a restaurant.

1908

Sun. Times (Perth) 26 Apr. 4/8: I’ve seen us rading restaurongs at night / When the bloke wot owned the kipsie wasn’t near.