What mattress do UK hotels use, and why does it feel better than yours?
Everybody has had the night away where they slept better than they have in months, lay there in the morning wondering what the hotel knows, and came home to their own bed feeling faintly betrayed. The good news is that hotel beds are not a secret. Several chains publish exactly what they use, and the pattern is the same everywhere.
What the chains actually use
Premier Inn has made its bed a selling point for years. It is made by Hypnos, the Buckinghamshire maker with a Royal Warrant, and Premier Inn sells the same mattress to the public through its own shop. It is a pocket-sprung mattress with a pillow-top, medium-firm underneath, plush on top.
Travelodge launched its "Dreamer" bed in the 2010s, made by Sleepeezee, and also sells it. Pocket sprung, a comfort layer, medium feel.
Marriott, Hilton and the international chains each have a branded bed (Marriott sells its "Marriott Bed"; Hilton has sold its "Serenity" bed), and they are all the same idea: a substantial pocket-sprung or coil unit, a pillow-top or a topper on it, and a firm base.
Independent and boutique hotels in the UK overwhelmingly buy from the contract divisions of the traditional makers: Hypnos, Harrison Spinks, Sleepeezee, Vispring at the top end, Silentnight's contract arm lower down. Contract mattresses are built to a hospitality spec: heavier than domestic, a firmer edge (people sit on hotel beds a lot), and made to be turned or rotated by housekeeping.
What they have in common
Four things, every time.
Pocket springs, medium-firm, in a substantial unit. Hotels do not buy soft mattresses, because they have to suit everyone from a jockey to a prop forward. The support underneath is firmer than most people buy for themselves.
A plush layer on top. This is the bit people remember. Either a pillow-top stitched to the mattress, or a separate topper (a "mattress enhancer" in hotel language), typically wool, cotton, feather, or a soft foam. Soft on top, firm underneath. It is the combination the premium trade has sold for a century and the one most people never buy for themselves, because shops make them choose "soft" or "firm".
A firm edge. Contract mattresses have reinforced borders. You can sit on the edge of a hotel bed to put your shoes on and it does not tip you off.
It is not very old. Hotels replace mattresses every five to eight years, on a schedule, whether or not anyone has complained. Most home mattresses are older than that. Part of what you are feeling in a hotel is simply a mattress that has not gone soft.
Then there is everything else
Be fair to the mattress: it is not doing all the work.
- The topper and protector add a layer of softness and are changed constantly.
- The linen. Crisp cotton percale, changed daily, pressed. Most people sleep on polycotton at home.
- Two duvets or a heavy top sheet, tucked tight, on a king or super king bed.
- Blackout curtains, a cool room, no phone, and a day where somebody else made the decisions.
Some of that is copyable. Some of it is being on holiday.
Getting the hotel bed at home
The order to do it in, cheapest first:
- Change the sheets. Cotton percale, 200 to 400 thread count, and a duvet that is heavier than you think. This is a tenth of the cost of a mattress and a third of the effect.
- Add a topper. A 5 cm wool, latex or soft memory foam topper turns a firm mattress into plush-on-firm. If your mattress is still supportive underneath, this is most of the way there.
- Buy the bed the hotel sells, if you slept on one you loved. Premier Inn and Travelodge both do, and it is an honest way to buy a known quantity.
- Buy a pillow-top mattress with natural fillings and a firm spring unit. This is what the boutique hotels have, and what a hotel-grade mattress from the traditional makers costs is in the low thousands.
How we built ours
The Hotel Bed is the plush-on-firm build done properly: twelve layers, with British wool, cotton felt and silk-blend fibre in a separately stitched pillow-top, a low-hardness plush memory foam so you sink without sweating, Talalay latex and micro-springs for the comfort, and 2,000 five-zone pocket springs in a side-stitched border for the hold. It is 38 cm deep, delivered flat and free, and every layer is listed with its density. It is the one we would put in a hotel.
If the budget is smaller, The Bad Back Years with a Soft Top topper gets you most of the way to the same feel.
The short version
- Hotels use medium-firm pocket springs, a plush top, a firm edge, and they replace them often.
- Soft on top, firm underneath is the whole trick.
- Sheets and a topper first; a pillow-top mattress with natural fillings if you want the real thing.
Ten steps to a hotel bed at home, cheapest first
The hotel bed is a system, not a mattress. Sheets, the topper, the pillows, the tuck, the room, and finally the mattress itself, in the order that gives the most difference per pound.
Pillow-top mattresses: the pros, the cons, and who they suit
The plushest mattress construction, and the most misunderstood. What a pillow-top gives you, what it costs you, the settling nobody warns about, and how to tell a good one from a soft polyester cushion.
The Premier Inn mattress: what it is, why it feels the way it does, and the alternatives
Premier Inn made its bed a selling point and sells it to the public. What the mattress actually is, why it suits hotels, whether it suits you, and what to look for if you want the same thing at home.