EcoCult Recos: Healthy Mattresses

"Open the window to let your mattress air out for 48 hours." What? Okay.

I call this the Fairy Forest room. My friends have started checking to see if it’s available before they confirm their visit.

I’m not sure there’s a humble way to share this information. I slept on a Hästens this week.

If you know what I’m talking about, then you know how extra this is. I have someone in my social orbit that has a truly impressive budget, who allowed me to sink into a cushy pillow top and all-natural mattress that together off-gas nothing but the scent of luxury for eight hours.

(True luxury smells like nothing, though there might have been some high-end hotel scent sprayed on it.)

If you don’t know what I’m talking about, well, I did a deep dive for Vox into the Swedish ultra-luxury and ultra-natural mattress company a few years back. TLDR; these mattresses start in the tens of thousands, and can cost as much as a Brooklyn apartment. Made of cotton, horsetail hair, wool, flax, and Scandinavian wood, it’s a mattress for the kind of people who have a private medical concierge service and purchase all their artisanal and imported foods at fancy Italian markets.

So, did I sleep like an oligarch’s daughter that has just given the family fortune away to the world’s poor? Well, no. I actually didn’t sleep very well. But I think that was because of the two dogs snoring all night nearby on their own relatively cheap bed. Poor dears.

Hästens is exquisitely non-toxic –– they even have a version where no electric tools were used—more grounding, apparently. I would recommend you book an appointment to try it if you have the budget (or gumption to pretend you do) next time you’re in NYC or LA. I haven’t recommended it before because, well, it’s pretty extra.

Instead, I’ll tell you my favorite non-toxic mattress! It’s not Hästens. It’s the one that prompts my house guests to inquire, and also the one that happens to be one of the most affordable.

(EcoCult members may share their own favorites in the comments at the bottom!)

But first, the scary stuff.

Not all mattress companies that bill themselves as eco-friendly are truly sustainable and non-toxic. The problem is, mattress companies are not required to disclose what exactly is in their mattress.

Conventional mattresses come with fire retardants, volatile organic compounds, and formaldehyde. Mattress companies will tell you to just let a new mattress air out with the windows open for 48 hours. But a 2019 study that looked at mattresses that had been allowed to off-gas (release chemicals into the air) for a full 28 days found that body heat would likely cause them to continue to release more toxic substances into the air.

And those VOCs could combine with others coming from other types of furniture, fashion, or your kitchen to bring them to dangerous levels. At first, VOCs will just cause eye irritation, asthma, headache, fatigue and nausea. But in the long term, that can lead to liver, kidneys, and central nervous system damage.

So here’s what to examine in your new mattress:

1. Latex or polyurethane? A company may call it “eco foam” or “cool gel,” but unless it’s natural latex, it’s most likely petroleum-based polyurethane foam, which one study (funded by the owner of an organic mattress company) found emits dozens of chemicals, including carcinogenic chemicals benzene and naphthalene. Polyurethane also off-gasses isocyanates, and recent research has identified a link between these chemicals and eczema. You want natural latex, which is made from tree-based rubber. Look for the Global Organic Latex Standard, which requires latex to be at least 95 percent organic and sets limits on toxic substances in the latex. If you are allergic to latex, look for a mattress that has an OEKO-TEX Standard 100.

2. Fire retardants or no? The fire retardants used today are not the highly toxic ones of yore, commonly known as Tris. But research shows the new types of flame retardants are likely potent endocrine disruptors, meaning they interfere with your hormones, and they have been linked to thyroid disease, which can manifest as fertility and menstrual problems, fatigue, racing heart, unhealthy weight loss or gain, and thinning hair. But mattresses don’t need fire retardants if they include wool. They don’t even really need fire retardants if they’re vegan.

3. Glue or thread? Binding mattress layers together with solvent-based glue can introduce more toxic chemicals into the mix. Look for mattress companies that sew the mattress layers together, or use water-based glue.

4. Certifications or greenwashing? Made Safe is the most exacting. It has a list of 6,500 banned substances for reasons related to both human and planetary health. Then there is Standard 100 by OEKO-TEX, which does allow for some substances below certain limits based on human health. Just make sure it’s for the whole mattress and not one of the materials inside it. Greenguard Gold purports to mean chemical emissions low enough to make it suitable for use around children or the elderly. However, I don’t believe Greenguard certification is stringent enough on its own. Ideally, there would no isocyanates wafting from your mattress. Avoid anything with California’s Prop 65 label, which warns you if there are carcinogens and reproductive toxins in a consumer product. Also, don’t be fooled by the CertiPUR-US certification. It was created by the Alliance for Flexible Polyurethane Foam, an astroturf organization created by the foam industry to give the appearance of safety.

My Favorite Non-Toxic Mattress…

is Avocado, and it has come up as one chemically-sensitive people enjoy as well. I like the basic mattress with a pillowtop. Avocado’s mattresses are Made Safe-certified, made with natural and organic materials, including eco-INSTITUT certified Dunlop latex from tree-tapped and sustainable sources; wool from its very own herd of sheep in India; and organic cotton. Avocado exceeds all federal flammability and CPSC standards without using chemical flame retardants. And it’s affordable!

Other Mattress Companies To Try

Based in North Carolina, Turmerry is a female-owned home goods company. Its mattresses are GOTS, and OEKO-TEX certified and are manufactured at a carbon neutralized factory using 100% natural latex, organic cotton, and New Zealand wool.

Spindle mattresses are manufactured using OEKO-TEX-certified organic Dunlop latex from Sri Lanka; organic cotton grown in Texas, New Mexico and sometimes India that is knit in the Carolinas; and OEKO-TEX-certified organic wool from New Zealand that is carded by Woolgatherers Carding Mill in California. Spindle’s latex mattresses don’t include chemical flame retardants, synthetic rubber or harmful VOCs.

PlushBeds mattresses are certified by Greenguard, GOTS Organic, USDA Organic, and OEKO-TEX. All of its mattresses are made in its factory in Camarillo, California.

Happsy uses natural materials including organic cotton, organic wool, and certified latex. There are no glues or adhesives in the entire mattress, which is fully Oeko-Tex-certified to be free of harmful substances.

Awara’s organic luxury mattress is made from natural latex foam, humanely sourced New Zealand wool, and organic cotton. Its natural Dunlop latex foam is sourced from thoughtfully-grown, Rainforest Alliance-certified rubber trees.

So which mattresses have you tried, and what was your experience?