The jump from a cot bed to a full single is a big one for a small child, and the mattress you put under them is the part I take most care over. The Woolroom Junior is the wool brand's own single for children aged three to twelve, sold direct by Woolroom and made in Manchester. It fills the gap between Woolroom's baby mattresses and its adult beds with a simple build: one layer of pocket springs in the middle, then coir, British wool and British alpaca on both sides, under a cotton cover woven in Lancashire. A child gets a proper new mattress in my book, and this is a proper one. Lie a small child on it and the wool gives a little at the surface before the springs take their weight, which is the medium-firm feel I'd want under a growing back.
It's the next step after Woolroom's two nursery mattresses, and the difference is size and depth. The Kids Luxury Nursery and the Kids Deluxe Nursery are 10cm cot and cot bed mattresses for babies and toddlers. The Junior is a 16cm (about 6 inch) single, 90cm wide, in the standard 190cm length or a 200cm Single XL, for the bed your child moves into next. My main reservation is that you buy the comfort layers on trust. Ask Woolroom how thick the wool and alpaca are on each face before you order, because that is where this mattress gets its comfort.
It's the right bed for a child moving out of a cot bed into an ordinary single frame, and for a parent looking for natural fillings next to their child. It suits you as well, because you'll end up perched on the edge for the bedtime story. Skip it if your child's bed is a top bunk marked for a 15cm mattress, or if you want a mattress you can wash rather than spot-clean.
I'd buy it. Pocket springs between natural fillings, with two faces you can sleep on, are what I want under a child, and the owners describe exactly the feel that build should give.
One layer of pocket springs, with wool and alpaca on both faces
Start in the middle. Woolroom quotes 1,000 pocket springs in a single layer, each in its own fabric pocket, so the patch under a knee or a hip moves without dragging the rest of the bed down with it. Under a child, pocket springs are the only kind I'd choose. An open coil is one wired-together unit, so a wriggle on one side travels across the bed.
On each side of the springs sits a pad of coir, the coconut fibre that gives the fillings a firm, even base, then a layer Woolroom calls British Wool Biobond, then the comfort filling of British wool and British alpaca. A Lancashire-woven cotton cover goes over the top, bottom and border. The maker lists wool, alpaca, coir, springs and cotton, and those are materials I'm happy to have under a child, since wool fillings sleep cooler and last well.
Woolroom calls the cotton organic, and I'd ask to see the certificate before I let that word sway me. The same goes for "hypoallergenic". Woolroom says its products carry the Allergy UK seal, so if allergies are the reason you're looking at wool, ask for the certificate that covers this mattress. The wool is also how it meets the UK fire standard without added flame-retardant chemicals, by the maker's account. Every UK mattress has to pass that test, so I count the method as a nice extra and nothing more.
Medium firm, and softer than the infant mattress it replaces
Owners land on medium firm. One parent who had braced herself for the hardness of a lot of natural mattresses wrote "I would say medium firm" for her three-year-old. Another, moving two toddlers up from infant mattresses she found very firm, said these have "just the right support and give". That matches the build. A small child weighs too little to push far into the springs, so what they feel most is the wool and alpaca on top, springy and dry, with steady support underneath.
For a child's bed I want it new, firm underneath and flat on top, and the Junior gives you that. There's no pillow top to sink into on either face, just the same filling on both. Parents get the benefit too. More than one owner sits on it to read at night, and one says there's no roll-down at the side even as an adult gets up off the edge. A mother who lies beside her son as he drifts off is saving up for one for her own bed, and another who slept a night on it herself had a very good sleep.
Both faces are the same, so turn it as well as rotate it
Because both sides are built alike, the Junior flips over as well as turning end to end, and I'll always prefer a mattress that does. Working the fillings from both sides lets them settle evenly, and a dip gets less chance to start in the spot where your child always lies. Woolroom's care advice is to air it and to rotate and turn it, and its guarantee terms ask for a rotation every two to three months. Owners who turned it often in the first few weeks describe it keeping its shape.
Sagging is the complaint that worries me most on any mattress. One parent of a two-year-old, not yet two stone, wrote that it had "sagged quite badly in some areas" within a few weeks. It wouldn't put me off, but it's the reason to turn it from the first week. If a dip does show, the guarantee treats settlement deeper than 2.5cm (1 inch) as a fault and anything shallower as the fillings softening normally, so measure it before you ring.
Check the base while you're at it. The guarantee doesn't cover a mattress on slats more than 7.5cm (3 inches) apart, and one parent who asked Woolroom before buying was given a much stricter figure, so get the spacing for your child's bed confirmed in writing before you order. When a mattress dips, slats set too far apart are where I look first, before I blame the mattress.
At 16cm, check the bunk before you buy it for one
On a top bunk the thinner mattress is the right one, because the guard rail only works if enough of it stands above the sleeping surface. Woolroom's own rule for the Junior is that the rails must sit at least 10cm (about 4 inches) higher than the top of the mattress. Find the maximum-mattress line marked on the bunk. If it allows 16cm and leaves the rails 10cm clear, the Junior will do, and one parent uses it on a top bunk where it keeps its shape with little support from the frame. If the bunk is marked for 15cm, buy a thinner mattress, and never add a topper or extra padding up there.
For anything about how a child should sleep, as against what they sleep on, go to the NHS and the Lullaby Trust.
No sleep trial, and a fee if you change your mind
Woolroom's adult mattresses come with a sleep trial, and the Junior doesn't. You get 14 days to change your mind, only while the mattress is unused and still unopened, and sending it back costs a 100-pound fee. So the decision has to be made before the wrapping comes off, which is why I'd put the layer and slat questions to Woolroom first.
It comes flat and unrolled, and the Junior is delivered to the doorstep, with a charge to bring it up to a higher floor, so plan to carry it to the bedroom yourself. Any standard single fitted sheet will go over 16cm. If your child's bed is an odd size, Woolroom makes bespoke sizes to order, though the depth stays at 16cm.
What to buy instead
Woolroom makes no other single for children, so the alternatives sit at Dreams. For a top bunk marked for 15cm, buy the Little Star Pocket Sprung Kids Mattress: it's 15cm deep and pocket sprung, the right depth to keep a guard rail doing its job.
If a cover you can take off and wash matters more to you than turning, look at the Little Big Dreams Natural Extra Comfort Pocket Sprung Kids Mattress. It layers cotton, coir, latex and wool over pocket springs under a removable cotton cover, and it's graded firm and made to be slept on one side only. That swaps the Junior's two faces for a washable cover. For an ordinary single bed, I'd still buy the Junior.
