All About Bed-Making
I will start off this post by saying that my husband thinks I’m crazy. “Tell us something we don’t know”, you say. The thing you don't know, is that this stemmed from a somewhat obsessive quest to luxuriously make our bed, and all beds for that matter.
I love my kids more than life itself, but there is something to be said for having a retreat when you don’t have to play mommy for a few hours before the first of many nighttime wake-ups. I wanted to fall into bed at night feeling as if I lived in a 5-star hotel and not wake up cuddling a crusty burp cloth. So, how to have a destination-getaway-worthy bed in my crazy twin baby filled house? With my clothes covered in a fresh, thick layer of spit-up and the sticky remnants of organic green veggie puffs crusted underneath my fingernails, I begin my journey.
Considering that I was looking for a bed similar to those found in 5-star hotels, I thought a 5-star hotel was a pretty good place to start looking for inspiration. I looked at everything from the Plaza in NYC to the Boulders in Arizona
Here’s what I discovered:
Pillow Placement
In reading about bed-making there seem to be several schools of thought regarding pillow placement. I have highlighted two common options that I gravitated towards.
The first option is to lay the “sleeping” pillows flat, as seen here:
Decorative pillows can then be placed upright in front of the designated “sleeping” pillows. When I experimented with this, I found that it limited my options in terms of what shapes and combinations of throw pillows I could use, and I wanted to avoid it looking like a terrible pillow accident took place on my bed. I do think it is a great option when only using “sleeping” pillows or very few throw pillows as seen in the picture. The result is clean, refined, and it has a minimalistic feeling I can really appreciate right now with baby toys strewn every which way into the farthest corners and depths of my humble little home.
The second option displays all pillows upright in a clean modern way:
I chose this option, because it simply felt a bit more luxurious to me. Nothing more than personal preference and the ability to use more varied shapes and quantities of pillows.
Throw Blankets
The next item on the 5-star checklist was: to throw or not to throw? Since I am ALWAYS cold, this was an easy decision. I have a ton of really great throw blankets just hanging around in baskets and closets waiting to be displayed. I did see a fair number of luxury hotels that don’t use throws on the bed or more modern hotels that fold the comforter at the foot of the bed and just display a crisp sheet set. In the end, I think it just comes down to the specific feeling that you are creating in your room.
To drape or to fold? My final choice was to fold. I thought it looked a little more tailored, but I will be trying the draped option out very soon to complement some funky sheets I just purchased! Here are examples of folded and draped:
FOLDED
DRAPED
Benches and Ottomans
The last piece was something to flank the end of the bed. I’ve always found the space between my dresser and bed to be a weird little unused space - you know, the place where shoes and dirty clothes get dumped when you’re too tired to put them where they belong? Many of the hotels I found used this piece of furniture to round out the space and provide a handy dandy little seat for shoe tying or, yes, those dirty clothes you’re really too tired to put away.
Here’s a great example that coincidently ties in all of the choices that I made when building my 5-star bed:
My choice, rather than a slimmer bench was a small scale ottoman. Pre-children, this ottoman lived in our living room and was retired when a coffee table became a necessity. It sat collecting dust in our basement until it found the perfect new home at the foot of our bed.
So, what was the end result? Have a look!
Tips
Some things I learned along the way:
DO: Use duvet covers so that you can easily change up your look and run a less than pristine cover through the wash.
DO: Mix patterns and have fun with color. I paired my white duvet with white and grey polka dot flannel sheets and orange plaid pillowcases to complement my throw pillows. I chose a small pattern and it worked really well with the larger scale bold pattern. The colors and textures of all of the elements of your bed add to the interest and help to boost the luxuriousness factor.
DO: Use a bed skirt if you do not have a bed frame that is meant to be seen.
DO: Turn down the top of your blanket after you have folded over the sheet flap so you don’t have to iron your sheets. This also works really nicely because it creates a cozy spot for your throw pillows to nestle.
DO: Tuck your pillow tails behind your pillows for a clean tailored look. Our pillows don't perfectly fit into our sheets so this really cleans it up.
DO: Use hospital corners to anchor your top sheet. Here's a helpful tutorial!
DON'T: Put your top sheets on backwards, the pattern should be inside so it shows when folded over.
DON'T: Put your top sheet on unevenly, it should be equal on both sides.
DON'T: Forget to take time to make sure your duvet is sitting correctly on your comforter and your comforter filling is evenly distributed.
Have a great bed-making style? Share in the comments below or send me a message at goodluckfoxdesign@gmail.com!