The first question everyone asks after you mention you’ve napped on a $175,000 bed is: “Is it worth the price?”
I can’t answer that; I’m not at the point in my life where any one item, except for a home, is worth the amount. But I can tell you this: Savoir‘s Royal State bed was the most comfortable bed I’ve ever taken a nap on.
The mattress was plush and soft—but not puffed up or flossy feeling—yet completely supportive. The silk sheets (which are included in the purchase price, as are the pillows, headboard, canopy and bed frame itself) were cool, substantial and, yes, silky. I had 17 minutes for my nap, so I climbed up on the bed—I love a bed with some height; it makes me feel like a fairytale princess—in the NYC showroom where it was being shown this week, put on my sleep mask, and lay down. I lay there with my eyes closed and while I didn’t fall asleep, I emerged from my quarter-hour-and-change with an incredibly deep feeling of well-being and restfulness. Even when I went to my office and got plunged into the usual maelstrom of e-mails, meetings and questions, I retained that inner serenity. If I could walk away with such a feeling after only 17 minutes on the Royal State bed, I truly believe I’d be able to run a corporation or a country if I could spend a whole night on it. (Which is appropriate because I’d need to be a CEO to afford such a bed.)
Here are details about the craftsmanship behind this bespoke piece: Only 60 are being made, according to Alistair Hughes, managing director of Savoir Beds, a 108-year-old British company. They’re numbered and signed (each bed is the handiwork of a single artisan in London or Wales). The headboard bears a hand-stitched crest or motif, and the sheets and cover are made of custom-dyed and woven silk thread (a mind-boggling 1630 miles’ worth). There are two toppers filled with a blend of Mongolian cashmere and hair from the tails of blond Argentinian horses placed on the mattress and box spring, which contain hundreds of hand-tied metal springs. (The mattress and boxspring have a 25-year guarantee.) The entire bed takes 604 hours, or more than 21 days, to manufacture (carpentry and joinery occupy one-third of that time).
One of these has already been sold to a lucky person in China. You can try it for yourself—although the store probably won’t allow you to nap—if you can make the trip to their showroom in London, where you can visit by appointment to see how a Savoir Bed is made.
