How we sleep at Floks

We spend our days helping people find the right sleep set-up for them, so it felt only fair to turn the question on ourselves. Here's what the Floks team actually sleeps on at home, the problems it solves, and the question each of us gets asked most often in-store.

Sara

My set-up is Perfectly Floks in regular tension, with a Floksy Topsy, a regular topper and one of our bed linen bundles. I have disc problems in both my neck and lower back, and since going through menopause, I've gone from someone who always felt the cold to someone who runs hot, while my husband, who's never without a merino base layer, still feels every draught. We used to solve this by layering blankets on top of the duvet, only for me to throw them off a few hours later. Our wool duvet is the first thing that's kept us both happy at once. When we changed our mattress, we tested the Floksy Topsy for the pressure relief it offers and paired it with a Perfectly Floks mattress, and the layers of wool, hemp and flax have made a real difference to the aches and pains, as well as keeping us both at the right temperature through the night.

The question I get asked most: doesn't wool just keep you warm, so how does it help in summer? It's the most common misconception we hear. The same property that keeps you warm when it's cold works in reverse when it's hot, since wool constantly absorbs and releases the moisture your body loses overnight, and it's that moisture regulation, not the wool itself, that keeps you at the right temperature either way.

Jodi

In my mid-forties I've noticed my body temperature has properly shifted, I've always been the cold one, and now I'm often kicking the duvet off in the night instead. I also sleep lightly, a habit I never quite broke after years of listening out for a crying baby, and I have a displaced rib from an old injury that wakes me if I lie the wrong way, which rules out anything too firm.

We joined Floks when we still had a memory foam mattress, and our first wool topper was the moment everything changed, better sleep from the very first night, just from adding one layer of wool underneath us. Since then we've moved to King of the Springs with our regular topper on top, and it was love at first lie. The All Season duvet solved the draughty-then-overheating cycle completely, and I switch between the medium quilted and medium standard pillows depending on the night. We finished the set-up with white bed linen, which is unlike anything we'd slept in before for how breathable and soft it feels.

The question I'm asked most in-store is firm versus regular tension. Firm often feels like the safer choice if you've had a bad experience with an unsupportive or sagging mattress before, but firm doesn't automatically mean supportive, and it can be harder on joints and pressure points if there isn't enough give for your body to settle into. More often than not, regular tension turns out to be the better fit once we've taken the time to find the right alignment for someone's particular body.

Sophie

As I've got older I've realised how sensitive I am to anything too firm. I have a large lipoma on my shoulder that flares up if I'm sleeping on something too hard, which is why we often tell customers you should sleep in a mattress, not on it. My husband has had back trouble too, and despite the old assumption that a bad back needs a firm mattress, he's found the opposite is true, especially after a work trip in a firmer hotel bed.

We've been on the Pillow Top mattress for a couple of years now and haven't looked back. It gives us the support we need with a softness that lets your body properly settle, and we never overheat. We added a Deep Mattress Topper on top, because why not. Our house runs hot in summer and cold in winter, so rather than an All-Season duvet we switch between our Summer and Winter duvets. I also always keep a wool blanket across the foot of the bed, since the weight over my feet genuinely helps me settle and stay asleep. For pillows, we have two Regular Large Soft and two Quilted Medium Large, and right now I'm loving our Green Sage bed linen, which gets softer with every wash.

The question I hear most is which weight of duvet to choose, and there's rarely one right answer. We usually ask a few things back: are you naturally a hot or cold sleeper, do you like weight, do you share a bed, how warm does your bedroom run? Once we understand how someone actually sleeps, rather than just the tog they assumed they needed, the right combination usually becomes obvious. That's really our approach to everything at Floks, there's no one perfect sleep set-up, only the one that's right for you.

Liz

We recently renovated our house and got to plan our bedroom from scratch, which meant upgrading to a super king, something I always tell customers to do if the space allows it, go as large as you can fit. Being able to choose a natural fabric for the upholstered bed base and headboard mattered to us too, and our hemp and wool option in oat is the perfect neutral against our scheme.

For the mattress we treated ourselves to King of the Springs, which gives us amazing support and real depth of comfort, topped with a Floksy Topsy for extra pressure relief, and it's like sleeping on a cloud. We have the medium quilted pillows, and a winter duvet for the colder months alongside a lighter summer weight one. Being able to adjust each pillow to the support we individually need has been brilliant, and I'd recommend it to anyone still hunting for the right one. Both my husband and I exercise regularly, I teach yoga a few times a week, and we've both noticed how much the improved sleep, especially from the new mattress and pillows, has helped our overall health.

The question I'm asked most is about dust mite allergies. Customers are often told to avoid feather bedding and steer toward synthetic instead, but wool is actually the better alternative, since it's naturally resistant to dust mites and bacteria while still regulating temperature through the night, so you get a comfortable, allergy-friendly set-up without compromising on either.

If reading this has you wondering whether your own set-up is the right one for you, we'd love to help you work it out properly. Book a sleep consultation and we'll talk it through together.