Duvets for cold rooms and cold sleepers
A winter duvet is judged hours in, not when you get in. That is when the heating is off, the room is at its coldest, and a duvet that only insulates has already let the warmth out.
For a cold room, the wool duvet. Wool holds warmth when the room cools and gives a little heat back as it releases the moisture it took in during the night, so the duvet is doing its most work at the coldest hour. For a cold sleeper who wants weight over them, the cotton duvet, which is hand-tufted from dense layers of organic cotton batting and drapes with a grounded, even weight. Our queen cotton is about 10 pounds and the queen wool about 9, close enough that the choice is about how each one behaves rather than which is heavier. Add a flat sheet under either and a cotton cover over it, and you have three natural layers that each trap a little air.
Cotton is heavy, even and still. Wool is a little lighter and it changes what it does through the night. Both are hand-tufted so the warmth stays spread over you rather than sliding to your feet.
Organic wool from New Zealand certified-organic farms, hand-tufted. It holds warmth when the room cools and releases moisture when you heat up, so you are warm without waking clammy under the extra weight.
Best for a bedroom that drops hard overnight
Dense layers of organic cotton batting anchored by hand, with a grounded weight that people who are always cold tend to love. It stays cool to the touch and warms with you.
Best for someone who wants to feel the duvet over them
The same organic cotton sateen on both faces, closing with a zipper along one side and tied inside to the duvet's corner loops so the warmth stays where you are.
Best for every duvet, all winter
A cotton layer between you and the cover traps a pocket of air and adds warmth without weight. It is also the layer you wash weekly instead of the duvet.
Best for adding warmth without a heavier duvet
Fitted sheet, flat sheet and pillowcases in 300 thread count sateen. Cotton warms to you rather than feeling cold on contact the way a synthetic sheet does on a January night.
Best for a bed that is not cold to get into
The same wool behaviour under your head. It keeps the air at your face dry and gives warmth back as the room cools, without the damp a synthetic pillow builds under a heavy duvet.
Best for cold bedrooms and a warm head
Why a heavy synthetic duvet still leaves you cold
A polyester duvet traps a layer of air and keeps it there. That works until the room drops and your body stops putting out enough heat to keep the layer warm.
1
The heating has been on, the bed is at room temperature, and the duvet traps the heat your body gives off in the first hour.
2
The heating goes off, the house cools, and the trapped layer under the duvet starts losing heat to the room through the cover.
3
Deep sleep lowers your body temperature on its own. A duvet that only insulates has nothing to add, so the layer cools with you.
4
Either the layer has gone cold, or you piled on blankets, overheated, sweated into polyester that cannot absorb it, and woke up damp instead.
Wool has something to add. Through the night it takes in the moisture your skin gives off, and as the room cools it releases that moisture and gives off a little heat as it does. The duvet is warming you when you need it most.
How wool warms
Wool fiber takes in water vapor from the air around you, up to 30 percent of its own weight before the surface feels damp, and it gives off a small amount of heat as it absorbs. Overnight the duvet fills with the moisture your body puts out. Then the room cools, the air under the duvet dries, and the wool releases that moisture back, drawing a little warmth with it. The result is a duvet that is doing its most work in the coldest hour rather than the first one.
That is the mechanism behind the line on our care card, warm in January and cool in July. The same behaviour that keeps a hot sleeper dry in summer keeps a cold sleeper warm in winter, which is why most people who buy the wool duvet for one season end up keeping it for the whole year.
How cotton warms
The cotton duvet is the one to reach for if what you want in winter is weight over you. It is made from layers of organic cotton batting that arrive as one cohesive pad rather than loose clusters, and the pad is hand-tufted at points so it cannot shift. What you get is an even, grounded weight across the whole bed, with no thin spots and no lump at one end, and a surface that stays cool to the touch and warms with you.
It suits a cold sleeper in a room that holds its temperature, and it takes layers well. A flat sheet under it and the cover over it add two pockets of air, which is how people in old, unheated houses stayed warm long before anyone rated a duvet. It is vegan, and it is certified organic as a finished product under licence GOTS-10229.
The layers around the duvet
Warmth is air held still, and every layer of cloth holds a little of it. A flat sheet under the duvet and a cover over it turn one duvet into three layers, which adds real warmth without a heavier duvet or the damp that comes from piling on blankets. It also means the two layers that get washed weekly are cotton, and the duvet itself stays clean and dry.
The cover is worth getting right in winter for another reason. A duvet that migrates inside a loose cover leaves your shoulders under an empty bag. Ours closes with a zipper along one side and has internal ties that take the corner loops on both duvets, so the warmth stays over you until morning.
Any duvet is warm when you get in. The question is what it is doing six hours later.
| Duvet | What it does as the room cools | How the night goes |
|---|---|---|
| Organic wool duvet | Releases the moisture it took in and gives off a little heat as it does | Warm through the coldest hour, dry by morning, and the same duvet works in July |
| Organic cotton duvet | Holds an even, grounded weight over you and warms with your body | Warm and still, and it takes extra layers well |
| Down or feather | Traps air well while it is dry, then clumps as it takes on moisture | Warm early, cold spots later, and it needs chambers to stay spread |
| Polyester winter duvet | Insulates only, and cannot absorb moisture | Cold when the room drops, damp if you pile on more |
| Two synthetic duvets clipped together | Doubles the insulation and the moisture trap | Hot when you get in, damp by morning |
| Electric blanket | Adds heat from the mains all night | Warm, dry skin becomes hot dry skin, and it does nothing without power |
The wool duvet. It gives warmth back as the room cools, so it is working hardest at the hour a synthetic has already given up.
Organic Wool Duvet ›The cotton duvet. About 10 pounds in a queen, hand-tufted so the weight stays even, and it warms with you rather than sitting cold on top.
Organic Cotton Duvet ›Add a flat sheet under it and make sure the cover is tied to the duvet. An untied duvet slides up inside its cover and leaves the foot of the bed empty.
Organic Cotton Flat Sheet ›Wool. It is warm in January and dry in July because it works on moisture rather than insulation alone, and most people who buy it never go back to a summer and winter pair.
Organic Wool Duvet ›They are close in weight, about a pound apart per size, so the honest answer is that they are warm in different ways. Wool holds warmth when the room cools and gives a little heat back as it releases moisture, which suits a cold room. Cotton is a heavier, denser, more grounded weight that warms with your body, which suits a cold sleeper in a room that holds its temperature.
We do not publish a tog rating. Tog is a laboratory measure of insulation used mostly in Britain, and it describes how well a duvet holds still air. Wool warms partly by insulation and partly by releasing heat as it gives up moisture, which a tog number does not capture. Our queen wool duvet is about 9 pounds, and customers in cold rooms use it through the winter.
For most rooms, yes. Wool holds warmth when the room cools and releases moisture when you heat up, which is why the same duvet is warm in January and dry in July. Someone who is cold in every season, or who sleeps in an unheated room, may prefer the cotton duvet with a flat sheet under it for the extra weight.
The cotton duvet is about 7.5 pounds in twin, 10 in queen and 12 in king. The wool is about 6.5, 9 and 11.5. Both are hand-tufted, so the weight stays spread evenly over the bed rather than sliding to one end.
You can, though most people find one of them plus a flat sheet and a cover is enough. If you do stack them, put the wool on top so it can still release moisture to the air, and expect a heavy bed. The two-duvet arrangement on our couples page is another way to use two.
Less than under a synthetic one, because wool takes the moisture your skin gives off into the fiber rather than leaving it against you. Overheating in bed is usually damp before it is hot. If your bedroom is heated all night, the cotton duvet is the lighter-feeling choice of the two.
It helps. A cotton flat sheet under the duvet traps another pocket of air and adds warmth without weight, and it is the layer you can wash weekly without touching the duvet. It also stops a cold duvet cover feeling cold on your skin when you first get in.
Usually because the duvet has slid up inside a loose cover. Both of our duvets have corner loops, and our cover has internal ties that take them, so the duvet stays registered to the cover and the cover stays on the bed. It is a two-minute job once and the problem stops.
Keep it in a cover and wash the cover. The cotton duvet is spot clean and sun only, and the wool duvet is spot clean or dry clean only, so neither goes in the machine. Air either one for a few hours on a dry day now and then, and expect 10 to 15 years from it.
Send it back inside 60 nights, and free shipping applies. Most people know inside two weeks of cold nights whether the duvet is right, and we would rather you found the right one than kept the wrong one.
Hand-tufted organic wool that gives heat back as the room cools, or hand-tufted organic cotton with a weight you can feel. Handmade in our New Jersey workshop.
See the duvets178 verified reviews
If you've sent more pillows back than you've kept, you're our customer.
“I have owned more pillows than I have owned houses and I have owned 12 houses.” This is by far the only pillow to use if you don’t want to wake up with sore shoulders or neck. I have replaced all the pillows in my house with this pillow.
I have compressed discs in my neck, and I have spent hundreds of dollars over the past 6 months trying to find one that will help me sleep. Every pillow I bought caused me to wake up in even more pain than the night before!! The buckwheat pillow is life-changing!! I have slept through the night and wake up with no pain!!
I was leery to try another expensive pillow without some sort of trial period after being very let down by a different company's natural fiber pillow… I don't hear anything at all with the buckwheat! It does stay fresh and cool as well, but most importantly it actually holds my head/neck up and in place. Which allows me to actually get rest instead of always adjusting.
I've been a buckwheat pillow customer for the last 7 years and I can say that Circadian has the highest standards of quality paired with incredible customer service. Very very impressed and would not hesitate to send anyone their way.
I have spent years searching for a pillow that feels supportive and comfortable all night. I have finally found it. I absolutely love the Buckwool pillow. I removed a bit of the material to get it to exactly how I want it… I rarely wake up with neck pain now.
I find myself switching between the two and loving the feel of both. I haven't woken up with a sweaty head with either and that's an amazing feeling especially in the AZ summer. The buckwheat side is a lot quieter and more comfy/soft than others I've tried in the past.
I have tried at least 10 different pillows in the last 3 years. Nothing has worked out except for this wool pillow. I have chronic neck pain which has been greatly reduced. I am very happy with my new pillow.
I have pretty bad chemical sensitivity (housebound most of the time)… I try to only buy totally safe, non-toxic products. I found this pillow to be very safe and non-toxic, and the packaging was fragrance free which is always a huge plus.
I ordered this pillow to replace my very old (but beloved) down pillow and I'm so glad I did. It is heavenly!… I advise you to heed the recommendation given by the quiz. I ordered cotton initially despite the quiz giving me kapok as a result… the quiz was right.
The quality craftsmanship and materials is evident… when I asked if extra stuffing were available for the second one I'm using as a knee pillow, they not only pointed me to the right place on their site, but also created a new, smaller 1-lb. refill size based on my request.
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