Readers – are iron beds comfortable?
Dear My Friend’s House reader. I need your help. I’m doing a straw poll, a wisdom of crowds type thing. Listen up: It’s not new, it ain’t a trend, but for ages I’ve wanted a black iron bedstead.
But here is the thing. I like to sit up and read in bed. And sometimes eat breakfast. Last weekend me and the fella spent most of the day reading the same copy of Andrew Rawnsley’s book on New Labour in bed. Sweet.So, my question is – can you do that in an iron bedstead? Or do the bars of the headboard stick in your back, no matter how many pillows you add? I don’t want to make a bad bed decision here. What has been your experience? Please answer honestly in the comments and I will go with the majority view. The power – as Paddy McGuiness says on Take Me Out – is in your hands.
I haven’t had the experience of this type of bed, but we always keep a big extra pillow each for reading in bed and then dispose of them on the floor when sleeping. It works with an ordinary bedhead. It does mean having two depths of pillow when the bed is made, but you’d should still be able to see the nice iron bedstead. One more thought – the one in the photo looks lovely but quite narrow – do they come in king-sized? I hope this is helpful despite lacking the requested hard experience!
I’ve just got rid of a similar bed from ikea which we had for only 18 months. It creaked whenever me or my other half turned over in bed! It was uncomfortable to sit up and read and in the end, I just didn’t want to spend anymore time there. I replaced it last month with a bed with a fabric headboard and I’m so glad. No more creaking! Whether a more fancy bed would be better I don’t know, but I’m not doing it again.
The headboards keep sticking out in your back and you have to keep adjusting the pillows. In my opinion, it looks good, but not sure about sitting up reading for a while there …
I have a beautiful Iron bed. It’s wonderful. As long as the iron bars on the headboard aren’t too far apart so the pillows fall through then it’s exactly the same as a normal headboard. I love my bed… so snoozy.
I used to have an iron bedstead, and it’s still in my bedroom at my parents’ house so I still sleep in it from time to time, and I love it. You do need a good (feather) pillow to get comfy, but as someone has already mentioned, as long as the bars aren’t too far apart, it’ll work a treat. Plus they look so lovely!
We have had iron bedstead for nearly 20 years and absolutely love it. Lots of pillows is the answer and then chucking some of them out at night. Utterly comfortable, but that may be down to the mattress – a top quality foam with a good thick layer of memory foam. (the mattress the bed came with – sprung, wasn’t so good and we got rid of it after 5 years). There is something very romantic and beautiful about an iron bedstead.
I have a black iron bed from Feather & Black. As long as you have enough cushions/pillows, it’s fine to sit up and read.
I have had 2 iron beds – one a pretty 4ft french one which had to be upgraded to a huge King Size when my partner came on the scene. I love them and yes it is true you do need sufficient pillows to make them comfortable to read but I have never had one that creaks. The mattress is important too and I would recommed pocket sprugn with a memory foam topper – divine.
I wanted one but my husband – health and safety guy – said no way in case the kids get their heads stuck in between the bars.
I’ve got an old one like in the pic, and it’s lovely for sitting up in bed in, as long as you have lots of pillows. So many pillows that you have to take them off before going to sleep at night (see any Jennifer Aniston film). Also you can get new sprung slats made, to hold the mattress, so it’s not creaky or uncomfortable to sleep in.
I’m considering painting it Arsenic or Nancy’s Blushes – any advice much appreciated.
Funny you should say that… I have painted samples of both on the walls. I think arsenic is great and I’m painting one wall in the spare room with it – eventually. Nice choice x