The pillow is not just another element of the room that should be taken lightly. Its usefulness to offer style, decoration and a good feeling of rest in the guest can give extra points to any establishment.
by María Cecilia Hernández Ocampo
If you notice that any of the people you travel with have a larger suitcase than usual, do not panic: you like to take your pillow for a walk.
Some travelers would rather have an extra load and pay for it than find an unpleasant surprise in the room when entering and realizing that no pillow will allow you to have a peaceful and restful sleep.
After trying again and again the ten pillows and cushions that place decorously and elegantly on the bed on which the traveler will rest, after rehearsing on the side, in the fetal position, face up, face down, and even one pillow on another, fatigue expires regardless of the torticollis that will accompany you for the rest of your vacation.
Faced with this situation, many hotel chains, large and small establishments, have decided to implement a service that promises to be the solution: a pillow menu, so that, as in a restaurant, the tourist finds the best option.
"A pillow menu is to give the user freedom to choose their comfort. It consists of not putting one or a couple of equal cushions on the bed but locating a variety there, depending on the size of the bed because you should not overload and you have to take care of the aesthetics of the room, "Fernando López, from the Ardeco Group of Spain.
According to Jesús Antonio Flores García, general director of Almohadas Asim, from Mexico "the ideal is that in single beds you should place two to three pillows of different supports, in double and queen size beds place four pillows and in king size beds place up to six".
When visiting portals and virtual communities of travelers it is common to find complaints related to the bad rest that spoiled what promised to be the best vacation. It is common to read that many tourists agree that at the time of going to sleep they take longer to "undress" their bed and fall asleep, than in their morning arrangement.
"I am one of the people who enters the room, stands in front of the bed and goes "to the attack on the pillows", I throw them on the furniture or the floor one by one until I leave only the one I have chosen; I take out the sheets that are very heavy and generate pain in the arms and in that I can take about ten minutes, "says a joking Internet user in the renowned hotel search portal Booking.com.
Analytical design
Choosing the number and type of pillows and cushions that will be placed on the beds is not a matter of intuition or innate good taste. To do this, you must go to the recommendations of an expert, not only in design but also in physical health.
Finding that balance between giving a touch of style to a room with colors, sizes and arrangement of pillows and offering the guest as many options as possible to facilitate their rest, has been the Achilles heel of the establishments.
"I have a personal experience from this element. I once walked into a room that bordered on simplicity: a bed in simple accommodation with a couple of white pillows, no more. I managed to worry. When I went to bed I was pleasantly surprised, I do not know if by chance or by success, that it was the perfect pillow for me, "noted from Colombia the consultant in design and interior decoration Claudia Valencia.
There is also the opposite case: enter a room and be dazzled by the style, creativity when arranging bedding and the beauty of the interior. And fade that shine when trying cushion by cushion.
For Flores, director of Alsim, this situation requires a study and a deep analysis and not the arbitrariness with which some people consider themselves experts in both fields: design and health.
This entrepreneur states that the average men are larger and more robust than women, which is why they need a firm pillow to rest on their side and usually a standard support pillow to rest on their backs, but you have to offer a soft pillow in case it is to the guest's taste to rest underneath.
Instead, average women require a soft to standard pillow to rest on your side, a soft to extra-soft pillow to rest on your back, and extra-soft to rest on your stomach, Flores continues.
"Normally with a king size pillow you can not turn when changing position, so we require 50 x 66 or 50 x 70 double pillows. Finally, my recommendation for what we call the ideal bed, is a combination of supports including two natural pillows and between four and six pillows per bed and per couple along with a decorative cushion, "explains the expert.
Identifying the enemy
For the experts consulted, a bad pillow is one that has a poor filling, one that they have made from textile waste, erasure or unsuitable fibers, which can be seen with volume when offered to a hotel buyer but when used they are immediately crushed. There are also fibers that do not withstand washing or lose their characteristics with this, which is not useful for anyone.
"It is important to comment that pillows that lose support as time goes by lose the objective for which it was created. When sleeping on your side, a pillow is required to fill the gap between the shoulder and the head so that the spine is straight without bending and if the volume and support of the pillow are lost it will not be able to be used or will cause a problem to the guest, you will have to splice two or three pillows to fill that gap in the shoulder which will no longer give comfort and will probably cause a twist ", details Jesús Antonio Flores.
For her part, Claudia Valencia assures that at the moment the trend is marked by synthetic pillows, mainly those from the United States called Cluster Fibers that are 100% special polyesters. Its finish is called puff balls, fiber ball or balls in different places.
"Unfortunately buyers of hotels of a certain category are looking for the cheapest pillow. Good pillows are expensive because they are made of an expensive and quality material, which offers its usefulness for a long time, "says López.
The pillow can be identified according to its size, its shape and the material from which it is made and filled. Standard, cervical, with rest levels, postural, relaxing. Extra soft support, soft, signature, super firm and extra firm. Synthetic fiber, hollow and siliconized polyester, cotton, foam, memory foam, hot and cold gel, fibers and hypoallergenic.
"Generally the conditions of five-star hotels, high category and grand tourism require pillows made of 50% polyester fabric 50% cotton of 180 threads. Good pillows last between three and five years if the washing and care recommendations are followed correctly," concludes Flores.
Leave your comment