Most people who end up looking at wool duvets have had enough of something. You wake up clammy, kick the duvet off, then lie there cold ten minutes later. Sound familiar? Wool sorts that out, and I'd go to Woolroom for it. The Rutland company sells its bedding direct, and the Woolroom Classic Wool Duvet in Medium is British wool quilted flat between two layers of plain cotton. It sits in the middle of the Classic range with 350gsm of wool, the weight for an ordinary heated bedroom from autumn to spring, and it's the one I'd tell most people to buy. Pull it up and it settles over you like a heavy blanket instead of puffing up round your ears, and it stays where you put it all night.
Each of its nearest relations changes one thing. The Woolroom Classic Light has 200gsm of the same wool and is my pick if you run hot or wake up in a sweat. The Woolroom Classic Warm has 500gsm, for a cold sleeper. The Woolroom Deluxe Washable Medium has exactly the same 350gsm and the same warmth in an organic cotton cover, and it goes in the washing machine. The wash and that cover are what the extra money buys. The Classic is dry clean only. That's the whole trade-off, and for most people the Classic comes out on top.
Buy it if your bedroom is heated and you sleep at a normal temperature, on your own or beside someone who runs a little warmer or colder than you. Wool takes up the damp that builds under a duvet and lets it go again, so you stay dry instead of going sticky and then chilly the way you do under polyester. It doesn't make you cooler; it stops you getting damp. Skip it if you already sleep with the window open in July, or if night sweats are the reason you're shopping, because the Light is the better duvet for both. And skip it if a duvet that can't go in your own machine would nag at you every week.
The washable Deluxe has the same wool, so the extra buys a wash
Put the two Mediums side by side and the wool matches: 350gsm of traceable British wool in each, and the same 7 to 10 tog band by Woolroom's own reckoning. What differs is what's been done to it. The Classic's wool is scoured twice, washed in a pH-neutral detergent and then left alone. The Deluxe's wool is bathed in a chlorine solution that smooths out the natural barbs on each fibre, and that treatment is what lets it go through a 40-degree wool cycle. The Deluxe also comes in organic cotton percale, where the Classic has 200 thread count cotton.
For most people the wash isn't worth paying for. To my mind a wool duvet wants airing far more than it wants washing, and a cover takes the everyday grime. The Deluxe is worth it in a house with small children, with a dog that sleeps on the bed, or with somebody who won't rest until the bedding has been through the machine. One owner who knows both ranges says the Classic's plainer cotton is less slippery, which makes it easier to wrestle into a duvet cover.
Is the Medium warm enough for winter? In a heated bedroom, yes
With the heating on, yes. Woolroom calls it the equivalent of 7 to 10 tog and says itself that wool feels different from person to person, which is why it gives a band instead of a single number. Owners who keep the bedroom in the mid-teens overnight call it just right through winter, and one in an older house calls it their winter duvet outright. My own rule is a cool room, around 18C, and a warm bed in it. The tog is the lever, not the thermostat, so set the room cool first and choose the duvet to suit it.
Wool won't cure night sweats, but it does stop the soggy part. One owner who still has the odd hot night says "the duvet is never wet", and that's a fair measure of what wool can do. The unhappy owners who write about warmth bought it for night sweats or the menopause and found it too warm, or no better than their old duvet. If that's why you're here, buy the Light, keep the bedroom cool and the bedding breathable, and if the sweats come with anything else, take them to your GP.
It works for a couple better than you'd expect. One owner with night sweats and a husband who's always frozen settled on the Medium as the one weight they could share, and both are happy under it. If a warm sleeper and a cold one are sharing one duvet, the Medium is the weight to buy.
It arrives thin and flat, and it's meant to
Take it out of its cotton bag and you'll wonder whether they've sent the summer one. It's flat, quilted all over in wide wavy panels, and much slimmer than a hollowfibre duvet. That's wool: dense for its thickness, so the warmth comes in a thinner layer. A double weighs about 2.7kg, and you feel that weight settle along your body instead of standing clear of you like a tent. Owners say it takes a few nights to soften and drape properly, so give it a week before you decide.
It doesn't rustle when you turn over, and the stitching keeps the wool where it was put, so it doesn't clump in the corners. The same stitching means it never fluffs up. If you love a duvet you can sink into, this isn't it, and one owner found all that quilting left it too flat and heavy for their taste.
It will smell of sheep when it arrives. Most owners who notice it say an afternoon on the washing line and a few days on the bed see it off, while a few found it hung about for weeks, and a smell that lingers past the airing is the one complaint I'd take seriously. Air it outdoors before the first night. If it still smells like a farmyard after a fortnight, send it back: Woolroom's sleep trial takes bedding back even after you've slept under it.
Dry clean only, which mostly means air it and leave it alone
There's no machine wash for a Classic, and I wouldn't chance one, because its wool hasn't had the treatment that makes the Deluxe safe in a drum. Woolroom's advice is to hang it outside for a few hours to let it breathe, and that's the routine I'd follow, with a cover on it in between. Don't vacuum-pack it for storage. If it ever needs a proper clean, find a dry cleaner who handles wool bedding and ask how they'll clean it before you hand it over. One owner had theirs come back "shrunk by over a foot all round".
Measure your duvet covers before you order. The Classic is cut to the standard cover sizes exactly: single 135 x 200cm, double 200 x 200cm (about 79 inches square), king 225 x 220cm and super king 260 x 220cm. A hollowfibre duvet squashes into a cover with room to spare, but a flat wool one fills it edge to edge, so a cover that's shrunk a little in the wash will feel tight. Owners report both a perfect fit and a struggle, so check the one you've got. There's no small double or emperor.
British wool, made in the EU
Woolroom says plainly that the wool is British and traceable to the farm, and that the duvet itself is made in the EU. Some owners assumed the whole thing was made here and were surprised by the label, so know it before you order. Scratchy labels bother me, so I understand the urge to cut that one off. Leave it on. One owner snipped theirs and found out later it was the way to trace the wool back to its farm.
Woolroom says the duvet holds the Allergy UK Seal of Approval and that its bedding range is certified to OEKO-TEX Standard 100, which tests textiles for harmful substances. Some owners with eczema or a night-time cough say they've been better under it. A named seal tells me far more than "hypoallergenic" on its own, and with both of those behind it, this is a duvet I'd happily put on any bed in the house.
What to buy instead
Stay with Woolroom and change the weight before you change the range. The Woolroom Classic Light is the one for hot sleepers, summer and night sweats, and the Woolroom Classic Warm adds wool for anyone who feels the cold. If a machine wash is non-negotiable, the Woolroom Deluxe Washable Medium is this duvet with the wash and an organic cover added, for more money.
If you'd rather one duvet for the whole year, the Woolroom Deluxe Washable 3-in-1 All Season poppers a Light and a Medium together for winter. Buy it knowing the poppers can come apart overnight, and when they do the two halves bunch up inside the cover. Away from Woolroom, the Hypnos Inspired By Nature Wool Duvet at Bensons is British wool and dry clean only again, made in Britain and sold in one all-season weight, for a good deal more money. I'd still buy the Woolroom, because picking the weight that suits your bedroom does more for your nights than where the duvet was stitched.
