American beds

I am probably not looking or searching correctly but can't find anything regarding US beds taken to the UK.  Now that the house sold we are starting to think about things we are going to take.  We aren't taking much furniture but thought maybe of taking our king mattress.  I know that I probably won't be able to find linen for it but am looking for advice or suggestions.

Thanks,

Kathy

I brought my queen size American bed.

There are two things to watch out for:
1) Will it fit through passageways and up stairs to get into the room where it will remain?
2) You will never find sheets here that exactly match, but these things are also not insurmountable.

I am seeing larger beds come into being here, however, and I do wonder if a time comes when we will see American standards be options (like those companies advertising American fridges). Grange (though I don't think it's originally American, I see it as an American company because it's rather prevalent there) is making inroads here, for instance. Their great big beautiful massive wooden sleigh beds are easily found...and I suspect they've kept American sizing. I'd be disappointed if they haven't, and certainly the man representing them in the shop I went into was American.

Back to my own 'adventure' with my bed. It's wrought iron and there was no way I wasn't going to bring it. Being canopy posed a problem, but it did unbolt in parts so I didn't give it too much of a think...until the day it arrived. It would not go upstairs. It would not go through the window. It just was not going, period. So I took out a hack saw and cried the whole time I 'made' it fit. Then the whole thing got bolted back together. No quite soldered, but with having fabric draped all down, the 'scars' are well hidden.

Sheets. Take a look at a piece of American letter-size paper and hold it up against the equivalent British standard of A4. One's too long and the other's too wide, but by smidgeons. Enough to make it frustrating. Buy your sheets in the US. Next trip to the US, buy more. For me it took about five trips to Bed Bath and Beyond before I got curtains, pillows and cases, bolsters, drapey things for the bed, duvet covers, sheets, etc. that all matched (thank goodness they kept the style for a few years running).
    It is my personal opinion, and I hope I don't offend anyone: I find that the styles available here are limited. You can have five different high street shops selling sheets and curtains and they all sell the same design. They seem to be stuck in purples and silvers, or limes and oranges, or royal blues and golds, in styles of scripty writing or angels, swirly bits or vertical stripes. Lovely material, don't get me wrong. But it's so much the same that it's getting real old. I've been seeing it for five years now.
    It's an individual taste. And my taste is very much within the brocaidey, dripping old money, stuff. (Hey, it's nice to dream, huh?)

I rambled...it's Saturday morning.  
My point is that you need to make sure your bed will fit into your home here. Next, buy your sheets in the US.

If you want a size comparison, or you want some custom sheets made for your bed, try this site:
UK and US mattress sizes
(Seems somewhat silly they didn't do eqivalent sizing cm vs. in.
Check out Leah's sizing chart:
UK Yankee Conversion Tools

(Just noticed: this link is to a place that's just up the road from me...5 or so miles!)

    It is my personal opinion, and I hope I don't offend anyone: I find that the styles available here are limited. You can have five different high street shops selling sheets and curtains and they all sell the same design. They seem to be stuck in purples and silvers, or limes and oranges, or royal blues and golds, in styles of scripty writing or angels, swirly bits or vertical stripes. Lovely material, don't get me wrong. But it's so much the same that it's getting real old. I've been seeing it for five years now.
   

I have a UK bed, but i buy all my sheets in America (I've never noticed a size difference though, to be honest) for the same reason as LisaE... the colours and styles dont suit my decorating taste!

We didn't bring our US bed to the UK, simply because it was time to get a new bed (over 9 years on the same mattress/box spring combo.)  I brought over my US linen, but bought new UK size fitted sheet and bedskirt for our UK bed.   I guess I could have made do with our US size stuff, but whatever, time for a change.

I do agree that the US seems to have a greater variety of bedding styles.  Target has great bedding, IMO.  Bed, Bath & Beyond, and other similar stores are great too.  There just isn't that same kind of variety at good prices available in the UK.  Marks & Spencers is pretty good, but much more expensive than say Target or JCPenney.

Clear as mud, huh?  I've decided that soft goods (clothing, soft home furnishings, etc.) are much cheaper in the US for equivalent quality.  I will be taking a very large empty suitcase back to the States this summer to fill with shopping.  I am also very glad that I went on a Target shopping spree right before we left for things like personal care items, OTC drugs, and cosmetics.  I shipped some of the stuff in our air shipment, and the rest with our sea shipment.  6 months later I still have contact lens solution, Advil, OTC drugs, toothpaste, and some cosmetic items in reserve.  Comparing prices here, I definitely saved money by buying in the US.  So, you might want to think about buying up some things in the US.  Depending on what your kids like to eat, you might want to buy US peanut butter and Kraft Mac & Cheese, too.  Kids multi-vitamins (chewable) are a must-buy in the US -- they are more than double the price here, at least what I've found.  Basically, most of your Target-type stuff will be cheaper in the US.  Especially kids clothes!  If you can buy up before you move and ship it, you will save money.  Eventually you will have to find equilvalent UK products, but it's nice to have familiar US products for awhile.

HTH,
Stephanie

Thanks so much for bringing this up!  I keep meaning to ask, because we have a beautiful cherry-wood ( I think) sleigh bed, it's absolutely massive, and we plan to bring it, but not the mattress & box spring-they're about 4 years old now so when we move next year it'll jmake more sense to buy new there.  The problem is, will we find mattresses there that fit it?

I agree completely on the sheets as well-I like Egyptian cotton, so I buy them whenever they are on sale, hoping to have at least 5 sets when we move.  (I figure, it doesn't bother me too much if they don't fit perfectly-but a too-small mattress on our behemoth bed would look odd.)  I'm already planning how to decorate when we get there, so I know what to get, which makes it easier too.  (I agree with you on the rich, "old money" colors-that's what I like too!)

SAF, take a look at the measurements on the chart in the link I gave above. You'll be able to see what the size difference is. I found it odd that they don't really have the box springs/mattress combo idea here as a rule. It's pretty much just a mattress placed on top of a whole bed unit that has some springs in it (buy your headboard separately). Saying this, it's not impossible to find the US box spring/mattress concent starting to make inroads here, but you'll have very few choices to pick from, and even fewer choices if you actually want the right size to fit. You may find that you're stuffing things inbetween the cracks left in order for your sleigh bed slats to not show.

My advice: Buy new box springs and mattress before you come to make sure that you have the right fit before it's too late to rectify...and also for a price saving.

You might also want to check out And So To Bed.

Here's a link indexing a few UK bed sites covering just about everything to do with beds:
A lot of links to bed stuff in the UK