How to Make a Bed

The bed is the centrepiece of the bedroom. Therefore, it is crucial for it to appear both pleasing to the eye and enticingly comfortable.

We are selling more and more super king sheet sets which seems to indicate an accelerating trend in favour of oversized beds. The largest bed on record is the “Great Bed of Wares” (circa 1590), which measures 11ft. by 10ft. wide and is on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. It is a beautiful four-poster bed, which is really a room in itself! However, when ordering a bed, it is important to remember that oversized beds often look bulky and make a room appear smaller.

Tips for Bed Making

1. To make your bed look really cosy, you need lots of rounded edges and plenty of pillows - unless you prefer a more modernist/Zen bedroom which can be very aesthetic, but not quite so inviting.
2. To smooth the angular lines of the bed and make it inviting, you need to use a top sheet under your duvet or a wool blanket. Ideally, a cotton pique blanket cover then lies on top of the blanket/duvet, as the name suggests and can be tucked in or let to hang along the sides of the bed. It can be either plain, in the same colour as the sheets or printed cotton pique with floral, ethnic or geometric designs and can be changed according to seasons. Finally, the decorative side of the top sheet folds elegantly over the lot and the bed looks wonderful.
3. Pillows should fill most of the width of the bed. So, for example, on a bed 5ft. wide use at least two pillows 30in. wide, one on top of the other.
4. On super king size beds, use at least two pillows 36in. wide with two slightly smaller pillows 30in. wide stacked on top.
5. Square continental decorative pillows always look nice propped up against the back pillows.

Did you know?

The expression “sleep tight” comes from the 16th Century when mattresses were stuffed with a mixture of straw and down and placed on latticework which constantly needed tightening to be comfortable. Someone using this phrase was simply wishing their friend a comfortable night on a mattress supported by nice tight latticework. Luckily, for us to sleep tight now, we only need delicious linens, comfortable mattresses and soft pillows. We spend one third of our lives in bed so we should spend more time and effort choosing our beds and linens than on practically anything else!

Next month we will deal with the big question: “Duvets or Sheets?”