I am an expert when it comes to sleeping – or should I say not sleeping.
An insomniac for decades, I’ve tried everything from hypnotherapy to acupuncture, including hotel sleep retreats where I’ve even been hooked up to numerous cables overnight to test the quality of my sleep. Everything was in vain.
Nowadays, I accept that sleeping will always be a struggle, even with the eye mask and white noise machine I always bring on my trips.
But my ears pricked up when I heard that The Mandeville, in a quiet area of Marylebone, was the first hotel in London to equip some of its rooms with Dux mattresses from Duxiana, the Swedish company that is the official bed supplier of Tottenham Hotspur Football Club. The players sleep in beds costing £25,000 both at home and at the exclusive Spurs Lodge hotel where they stay before matches.
The Mandevilles aren’t exactly the same, at £10,000 for the mattress, but the Dux 31 still uses the same sleeping technology, which Geoff Scott, Spurs’ head of sports medicine and science, says is “more than just a mattress…The whole sleep system is a key part.”
Jane Knight (above) checked in at The Mandeville in Marylebone. It is the first hotel in London to equip its rooms with Dux mattresses from Duxiana valued at £10,000.
A Dux bed in the Duxiana flagship store in Marylebone, just a short walk from The Mandeville
The crux of the matter is that a continuous open coil replaces regular springs, meaning the mattress conforms to the shape of your body as you move while you sleep. Sandwiched between the springs and a top layer are three separate pads (Duxiana calls them cassettes), which come in soft, medium, or firm options. These adjust according to your weight, height, and body type to align your spine, supporting your lower back while letting your shoulders and hips sink.
Before you stay at the hotel, you fill out a questionnaire about your physique and sleeping patterns, and they adjust the cassettes to best suit you. Mine were medium at the head, soft in the middle, and firm at the legs, which is what most women need (sadly, considering the tummy and butt, I thought). Men’s heavier shoulders mean they are softer, medium and firmer from head to toe.
The Duxiana store will refund customers up to £500 for their stay at The Mandeville (above) if they purchase a mattress.
Rooms with Duxiana mattress cost from £280 per night with continental breakfast
And so, off to bed after an excellent three-course meal at the hotel’s Reform Social & Grill restaurant with a single glass of red so the alcohol wouldn’t affect the quality of my sleep. I had one of the Riviera rooms on the fifth floor, designed by Maison Christian Lacroix, and it certainly lived up to its Midnight Blue name, with bright and darker shades of blue, as well as pops of pink.
Jane revealed that with the Dux mattress (above), the amount of deep sleep she got doubled
More dramatically lush than calming and comforting, it did, however, have two important prerequisites for a good night’s sleep: curtains thick enough to block outside light and air conditioning that you could set to 18°C. And then there was the bed. . As soon as I lay down on it, I knew what Dutch centre-back Micky van de Ven meant when he said: “when you lie down it’s really comfortable and you feel like you’re really resting… it’s first class.”
I sleep on an Emma mattress at home, which helps with my hip pain. The Doge calmed those hips instantly. My sleep was still interrupted, with moments of semi-wakefulness: a single night on a top-quality mattress is not enough to undo years of insomnia. But what I did notice is that the amount of deep sleep I got doubled and I woke up feeling much more rested than usual. “With your spine aligned, you enter deep sleep more quickly,” says David Jacobs, UK and Ireland director of Duxiana.
So is the mattress worth £10,000? Probably, if you have that kind of cash. And it’s a bargain compared to the Hastens bed, made by a rival Swedish company, which will set you back hundreds of thousands. You can try Dux beds in several hotels around the world, including the iconic Burj Al Arab in Dubai and the Grand Hotel in Stockholm. You can even sleep in one outdoors at Sweden’s Pater Noster for a starlit experience.
But for the best try before you buy, book a room at The Mandeville. If you sleep better and want your own mattress, the duxian store is just around the corner and they’ll refund up to £500 for your hotel stay if you buy one.
Rooms with Duxiana mattress cost from £280 per night with continental breakfast, a welcome glass of champagne and sleep tea before bed (mandeville.es).