My husband and I are looking at mattresses, as our needs have changed now that we are in our mid 60s, with more health problems. We are pretty fit and physically active, but I have serious knee problems, arthritis, we both have back problems, and my husband has a serious shoulder problem. We used to love firm mattresses, but need more of a cushioned experience now. We have been sleeping on a Hastens, which we grew to hate very quickly after buying (it’s an instrument of torture), and had serious problems with the company, so we are trying to avoid the same mistakes in purchasing that we made with that purchase. We have narrowed our list down to a few. We love the Vispring (Tiara), but are concerned about some posts we have found on other web sites about durability. In your durability guidelines, you mention cotton, wool, horsehair and silk (the Visping components) as less durable: will these affect the comfort level changes more quickly, even in that high quality mattress? We have encountered some valuations on that brand indicating that they rate low on durability. We also want to ask a question on buying just the mattress without the bed systems that they offer. We have a platform bed, so it will not have the springiness that comes with buying their base, and they do sell the mattress without base…but how smart is it to go in that direction? We have even asked them to let us try the mattress on the floor, to see the comfort level without the base, just want to avoid a serious mistake. We thought if we buy a soft rather than a medium level, it will help compensate for the lack of a base with springs…. Or is it better to go medium, to provide more spring against the harder platform base?
The other mattresses we are looking at are the Berkeley Ergonomics (the Oslo) and the Leesa Legend (and maybe adding a Vispring cotton/wool topper to either one to make them more plush). They both seem to have less of that soft sinking thing we seem to need now. But will they hold up better…in other words, if we buy the Vispring based on it’s initial comfort level, will the materials matte down quickly leaving us with a changed situation, since it is not as durable? Will the Leesa Legend or the Berkeley Oslo be more durable choices, in terms of not changing as much with usage? Of the 3 choices, which would be considered the most hypoallergenic/safe for the consumer? And which may be the best for our particular health issues?