I started out with the clear intention of buying a memory foam mattress. I really like the feel of memory foam and my husband is more or less in agreement. I went through the research steps Phoenix advises and had come down to making a choice between “the good and the good.” I was at the point of making a final decision between two mattresses.
Then I decided to do one more test. Yes, I’m overly cautious. Like many others on this site, we bought our last mattress without knowing what we were doing and ended up with a wretchedly, overly soft mattress that’s never suited us. We want to be as sure as possible that we are making the right choice this time around. So for this last test, I went to the Urban Sleep Store. I lay on a few mattresses and had confirmed for myself that we’d order Brooklyn Bedding’s or Select Foam’s version of the TempurPedic Rhapsody Breeze when I made the big mistake. I decided to lay down on the OrganicPedic Flora Nouveau. I’ve never liked the springy feel of latex before and this held true no matter how I played with the layers to adjust the feel. Well, I love this bed. Noooo! Now I have to go back to the drawing board and read all about latex. I know nothing about the specs for this mattress (except the very hefty price tag) or about what one should look for in latex mattresses.
At least I know where to turn to get my education. Thank you Phoenix for creating this site and doing all the work to keep it going.
I’m sorry that you ended up testing the Flora Nouveau and ended up somewhat starting all over again (not really but I do understand :))
The good news is that you know there is a combination of latex that you know you like and you have new options. The challenge is how to find something that is a reasonably close equivalent in a more reasonable price range.
The Flora Noveau is a two sided mattress with a 3" 100% natural firm Talalay latex inner core which is “sandwiched” with a 2" layer of soft 100% natural talalay on each side and then has their wool quilted cover around this. The difference in the “feel” compared to some of the other latex mattresses you may have tried would probably be because of the difference in design (latex type, layer thickness, and ILD) as well as the cover which uses thicker layers of wool which reduces the resilience and changes the “feel” of the mattress. All of these can make a significant difference in how a mattress feels and performs.
Of course the cost of the Flora Nouveau is very high based on the value of the materials alone (7" of 100% natural Talalay latex and a cover with thicker layers of wool) but it’s the combination of all the materials and components that leads to how a mattress feels and performs and in some cases the “feel” of a mattress may be one of the most important parts of its “value” even though it’s not good value based on the materials alone. There would need to be a significant difference though between this mattress and another similar mattress to justify the higher cost for most people.
OMI may not be willing to disclose the “comfort specs” of the mattress (such as the ILD of the latex or the details of the cover) because of course they don’t want to encourage their potential customers to try and duplicate it by ordering layers of latex that are the same or similar and then adding a cover that used similar amounts of wool in the quilting but you may be able to approximate the “feel” with a mattress that used similar materials and components if you are able to find them out. It may even be able to approximate it by adding a wool topper over a mattress that has a similar design that used less wool or no wool in the cover although any changes in the design of a mattress can add up and can lead to significant differences in how they feel. If I had to guess I would say that the soft was probably N2 and the firm was either N4 or N5 (you can see the ILD range or each here) but of course this is just speculation and not anything that I would take to the bank.
There’s no doubt that the OMI mattresses use high quality materials and in many cases “feel” great … (my favorite when I was testing them was the Terra with the topper) but that’s a completely different matter from deciding whether they feel so much better than any other mattress that they are worth the significant premium that goes with them.
Thank you Phoenix for creating this site and doing all the work to keep it going.