Devon Duvets Blog

Mattress toppers are great for adding an extra layer of cosy comfort to your bed, providing a nice thick layer that will give you additional support and help you to achieve a better night’s sleep. Additionally, toppers help to extend the life of your mattress as they reduce the pressure on your mattress springs and lessen the amount of general wear.

Most mattresses need to be turned regularly to prolong their life and ensure you are getting the best support for your body, but this isn’t always achievable for everyone. If you are able to flip or turn a mattress topper this presents a much easier option, as well as helping the topper to keep its shape through even settlement of the materials.

Mattress toppers come in a variety of materials and fillings, and you’ll want to ensure you choose the right one for your needs. Good Housekeeping recently revealed their 10 best mattress toppers, all of which were Tried and Tested by the highly respected Good Housekeeping Institute - and we’re proud to say that not only was one of our mattress toppers in their top ten picks, but it was awarded Best Wool Mattress Topper!

Each one of our gorgeous wool toppers is individually handcrafted by our expert seamstresses at our Devon workshops. We only ever use certified 100% British wool, encased in 100% natural brushed cotton. They do not contain any bonding agents, glues or synthetic liners and our wool is not cleaned with any bleaches or chemicals. So, from top to toe – you’ll be sleeping on something that’s 100% natural!

Breathable and temperature regulating, your topper will keep you nice and snug when it’s cold but will also radiate any heat away from your body during the warmer months, helping to keep you cool.  Another great plus point is that our toppers are hypoallergenic too, as wool is resistant to dust mites and the built-up of micro bacteri

We’re proud to say that our award-winning certified 100% British wool duvets are handcrafted here in the beautiful county of Devon. If you’ve ever wondered about the journey that our wool goes on - from the sheep all the way to providing you with a better night’s sleep - then let us fill you in.

Our wool only ever comes from live sheep bred by British farmers and we only accept wool that has been shorn during the spring and summer. This is when the sheep require shearing to keep them cool and happy during the warmer temperatures. All of our wool is certified by British Wool so we know we’re helping to support British farmers.

The wool is then scoured in British mills, without using any chemicals or bleaches, to ensure that all of the natural properties are left intact. This means that when you snuggle up at night in our bedding, you can be confident that it’s just as nature intended and kinder on your skin.

Next is a process called ‘needling’, where the wool is needled into soft layers to create lots of loft, trapping air and creating a gorgeous filling that is naturally temperature regulating and breathable. We have developed our own unique and special way of needling to deliver the highest standard of wool bedding. Needling also ensures a consistent thickness and that the duvet won’t “clump” with use.

After that, it’s our seamstresses time to shine and they lovingly handcraft each and every duvet, encasing the wool in 100% natural cotton. When our seamstresses finish each duvet, they include a handwritten card with their name on, so you’ll know exactly who’s made yours.

We then carefully pack our duvets into our reusable packaging, tucking in a small sachet of English lavender for your linen cupboard. Our free next day delivery allows you to snuggle up in comfort and enjoy the benefits of our naturally breathable and temperature regulating British wool duvets without delay

We all need to sleep, it’s a fundamental part of our lives and essential to keep us happy and healthy. However, sleep is especially important for children, as it directly impacts their physical and mental development. There are many studies that show children who sleep well each night are better equipped to handle the day ahead, with improved attention, memory and behaviour.

As children flock back to school for the new term, now more than ever, you’ll want to ensure that your child is tucked up and sleeping as soundly as possible. The amount of sleep recommended for children varies depending on their age, so be sure to check out how much sleep your little one should be getting in order for you to choose the perfect bedtime for them.

The NHS recommends that a relaxing bedtime routine should be followed each night, such as giving your child a warm bath, dim lighting to settle them and quiet activities once in bed, such as reading or listening to music. It’s also best that you don’t allow any screens in your child’s room at bedtime, so avoid the use of smart phones or tablets.

A quiet, cool environment is best for achieving a restful night, and ensure that the room isn’t too light. It can be difficult to keep your child cool as children are less able to regulate their own body temperatures. However, our Little Lana range of certified 100% British wool children’s duvets can help with this as they are naturally breathable and can help with temperature regulation.*

Our children’s bedding range is handcrafted and is also made with 100% natural products, so there won’t be any harsh chemicals on your child’s skin. Additionally, the hypoallergenic qualities of our wool duvets and pillows help to relieve the symptoms of allergies and asthma, letting your little

At Devon Duvets, we’ve been making beautiful, handcrafted certified 100% British wool mattress toppers for over eight years and for thousands of customers who wanted that extra little bit more comfort on top of their mattress. 

Strange though it may seem, as well as being gorgeously soft and comfy, our wool mattress toppers can also help to keep you cool when it’s hot and warm when it’s cold - and this is down to the fact that wool is breathable and works with your natural body temperature as well as the temperature of your bedroom.

That got us thinking about beds in recreational vehicles. Our owners, Dick and Pauline are keen travellers and have their own converted VW Transporter. They wanted to make their sleep experience even better whilst travelling, so asked one of our experienced seamstresses to create a mattress topper that would fit their customised bed unit. 

In addition to crafting a special size topper, the seamstresses had to include specially cut areas that would match two curved mattress corners and fit around seatbelt holders. The result was a terrific success, with the mattress topper adding a gorgeous extra 5cm layer of comfort on top of the mattress. Shortly after this, Dick and Pauline were discussing the success of their topper with the owner of Slidepods, the company that converted their VW Transporter, and he requested a bespoke mattress topper for his own van.

The idea was born to create a range of mattress toppers for various models of recreational vehicles, including VDUB Transporters (T4, T5 and T6), as well as for customised bed systems by Slidepods, REIMO and Canons Forge. The range also includes toppers for VW California, VW California Grand and Mercedes Benz Marco Polo vans. 

All of our products are individually handcrafted, so it makes it easy for us to create bespoke sizes for other models too,

We’re understandably proud of our certified 100% British wool duvets because we know how much care and attention goes into the making of each and every one. Firstly, we choose our wool from British farmers, who are known to have some of the best looked-after sheep in the world. 

We get our carefully selected wool cleaned (known as ‘scouring’), without the use of bleach or chemicals, at British mills. The cleaned wool is then needled, with plenty of ‘loft’, to make it into super soft layers. 

Our experienced seamstresses, based at our Devon workshops, then handcraft each duvet, encasing layers of wool into beautifully soft, 260 thread count, 100% natural cotton.

So, it makes all the hard work even more worthwhile when we win a ‘Best Duvet’ award from a national newspaper, not once, but for two years running! The Independent has twice selected our lightweight certified 100% British wool duvet as the cream of the crop, from a shortlist that consisted of nine other duvets with a variety of fillings including hybrid, synthetic, feather & down, linen and silk. They described our duvet as ‘sheer joy to sleep under during the summer months…’ and we’re delighted to say that thousands of our happy customers over the years agree with them!

Our lightweight 100% British wool duvets contain 300gsm of wool - exactly half the amount of our warmer weight 100% British wool duvets - and are stitched to ensure a lovely drape. They don’t need shaking out because the wool layers are carefully stitched inside their cotton casing, which means you won’t end up with all the filling on one side or at the bottom of the duvet as you do with some kinds of filling.

There are health benefits too! Wool is naturally breathable and temperature regulating so your lightweigh

Our thousands of happy customers know that we are committed to responsible sourcing when it comes to our wool bedding products. Some of our customers ask how we ensure that our wool comes from farms where the highest animal welfare standards are followed.

The answer is that 100% of the wool we use is British wool and British sheep are some of the best cared for sheep in the world. In the UK, the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) is the government department responsible for many standards to do with environmental protection, food production and animal welfare. They exercise very strict controls over farmers and often visit unannounced to inspect animals in their care. Any farmer not considered to be upholding these standards would be banned from keeping sheep.

Additionally, in Britain, the practice of ‘mulesing’ is a banned and illegal practice, whereas in many countries this is normal. By purchasing British wool, we are not only supporting British farmers, which is very important to us, but we also have the assurance that the sheep have not had to undergo this unnecessary and often painful practice. 

British Wool is the organisation that works with British farmers, setting the standards for wool quality through their comprehensive grading system. They are also the approved provider for shearing and wool handling training in the UK, with a programme of courses that are recognised across the world and which are led by a team of registered, highly experienced instructors. At Devon Duvets, we only ever accept wool from live sheep that have been shorn in the Spring or Summer, when the sheep naturally need to lose their heavy fleeces.

So, by purchasing one of our products made from 100% British wool that has been certified by the British Wool organisation, you can be confident that you are buying a high-quality product that comes from an animal that has been ethically treat

Sleeping patterns vary hugely from individual to individual but at the moment, during the COVID-19 pandemic, many people are reporting big changes in the way that they sleep.

A recent survey carried out by market research company Ipsos MORI and King’s College London has suggested that whilst some people are sleeping more than usual, nearly two thirds of the public have reported some negative impact on their sleep, with more than half of the UK population struggling with sleep during the lockdown. Additionally, previous research reported patterns of disturbed sleep, insomnia and vivid dreams.

This is entirely understandable, when everything is so unsettled. Many people are worried about their jobs, their families and their finances and we all know that stress can be one of the major causes for lack of sleep and this becomes a vicious cycle, with people becoming more stressed as a result of a lack of sleep. The survey was carried out in late May with 2,254 residents in the 16-75 age bracket. 

There’s been lots of expert advice out there over recent weeks, including taking exercise, building a routine for your day (even if you are furloughed) and getting out in the sunshine, the latter of which is a mood ‘booster’ and also helps us to generate Vitamin D. Exposure to sunlight also stimulates the production of melatonin, which regulates our ‘sleep and wake’ patterns. Reduced melatonin levels can lead to less sleep.

Professor Kevin Morgan, a psychologist from Loughborough University, says that having a routine really helps to get a better night’s sleep and that preserving consistent sleeping patterns are important. Suddenly going to bed much later if you usually go to bed at 10:30pm is going to be a disruption to your sleeping pattern and when you add stress on top, that will make it worse. He also says it is best to save any sleepiness for bedtime, rather than taking extra naps during the day.

Creating a cosy, welcoming bedroom space

At Devon Duvets, we have always been committed to responsible sourcing. It has been at the heart of what makes us tick, since Dick and Pauline Beijen founded the company over 10 years ago as we feel we all have a responsibility to help protect the world for future generations.

For our award-winning wool bedding, we only ever use certified 100% British wool, from British farmers who only shear in the Spring and Summer, when the sheep naturally need to lose their winter fleeces. Our wool is then cleaned and milled in British mills, without the use of bleaches or chemical treatments before being individually hand stitched into 100% natural cotton casings by our expert seamstresses, here in Devon. 

Our plant-based Botanic duvets are made from fibres containing TENCEL™Lyocell, made from sustainable wood sources through an Eco award-winning process. As with our 100% British wool duvets, each of our Botanic duvets is handcrafted by our seamstresses at our Devon workshops. Also an award-winner, our Botanic range was the first bedding of its type to be registered by the Vegan Society.

We’ve also worked hard to make sure that all of our packaging is either recyclable or reusable.

So, it’s not really surprising that our aim is to be sustainable in our everyday processes here at our Devon workshops, and this includes our long-held commitment to achieving a ‘zero waste’ policy

The good news is that we’re almost there and are proud to say that over 99% of everything we produce in terms of ‘waste’ is either reused or recycled by other manufacturers or businesses in the UK, including off cuts from our duvet fillings and duvet casings.

For example, if you use lined rubber gloves at home for household chores, chances are that you’ve already been using one of our recycled products. The ‘offcuts’ from our 100% natural cotton duvet casings are baled up into pallets and collected by a rubber glove manufacturer. The cotton is then recycled and u

We’ve been curious as to why, just recently, and all of a sudden we’ve started to get a lot more enquiries about our certified 100% British wool duvets from across the pond in the United States. At first, we thought our customers had friends or family in the USA and were spreading the word… however it turned out to be something entirely different!

Many of our long standing customers will remember that in 2010, Monty Don featured our owners, Dick and Pauline, in the first ever episode of his Channel 4 series ‘My Dream Farm’. Dick and Pauline had decided to leave their busy international careers and settle down to a life on the land, having purchased a smallholding on Dartmoor, in Devon.  They quickly set about working on a number of craft-based projects, got a flock of sheep, learned about beekeeping and also started to talking to other local sheep farmers about making products using wool. It was at this point that they were discovered by Monty Don and the journey began to start the process of making 100% British wool duvets on a wider scale – and Devon Duvets was born.

We have since discovered that ‘My Dream Farm’ is currently syndicated across TV networks in the USA. It is proving hugely popular, and this is why we are receiving enquiries from potential customers living in various states across the USA. The fact that our wool bedding products are handcrafted in the UK, using 100% British wool, seems to be resonating with people. The one thing that they all have in common is that they are looking for a 100% natural product that will help them to achieve a more restful night’s sleep - especially when getting a good night’s sleep has never been more important to overall health and well-being. Our thousands of happy UK customers already know about this and it seems that it’s catching on!

As it was originally broadcast 10 years ago in the UK, you might not have seen the episode about the start of our journey, and although it isn’t still on catch up

You spend an average of 7-8 hours out of every 24 in bed and so what you sleep under is incredibly important if you want to be sure of a restful night’s sleep.

At Devon Duvets we take sleep very seriously and our seamstresses at our Devon workshops take great care in handcrafting our certified 100% British wool duvets. Wool is such a beautiful natural and sustainable product that we want to keep it as close as possible to the way nature intended. 

Wool has many wonderful features, including being naturally breathable and temperature regulating, helping to keep you cool when it’s hot, yet lovely and snuggly when it’s cold. As it is dust mite resistant and also resistant to the build-up of micro bacteria, it is naturally anti-allergy, which means it is the perfect bedding for those suffering from asthma or other allergies. It is also naturally fire retardant.

We only ever buy top quality 100% British wool from British farmers, who have the highest standards of animal husbandry and who only shear live sheep in the spring and summer when they naturally need shearing. Our wool is certified by British Wool, the organisation responsible for collecting and grading British wool on behalf of the farmers.

Our wool is then sent to British mills for cleaning (known as ‘scouring’). No chemicals or bleaches are used in the cleaning process – better for you and better for the environment. The wool is then needled to create ‘loft’, trapping air between the fibres and creating a luxuriously soft wool layer.

Some wool duvet companies use wool that has been treated with chemicals to make it ‘washable’ but we don’t do this for two main reasons. Firstly, the chemicals used for this process are usually a form of chlorine gas, followed by a coating to smooth the wool fibres. When washed out, these chemicals can enter the wastewater systems and, if so, impacts on the environment. At Devon Duvets we are com