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- All natural materials and no synthetic foam
- Particularly comfortable for back sleepers
- Good temperature regulation
- Small amount of motion transfer
- Too firm for lightweight side sleepers
The Natural Lux Hybrid is a step in a different direction for REM-Fit: a brand better known for its hybrid mattresses. This is an all-natural mattress that doesn’t use any foam, making it a fantastic choice for allergy sufferers and those looking for a hypoallergenic setup. Natural and organic mattresses are some of the best mattresses you can buy, but they often come with a very hefty price tag. And while no one could call the REM-Fit Natural a budget mattress, it’s considerably cheaper than a lot of its all-natural rivals, with RRP prices starting at £700 for a single.
Great as it may be for allergy sufferers, the materials mean little if the mattress isn’t comfortable to sleep on. Fortunately, the REM-Fit Natural offers high levels of comfort and support – particularly to back sleepers who will find their lumbar regions well supported. Read on and I’ll fill you in on who will love this mattress, and who should look elsewhere.
REM-Fit Natural Lux Hybrid Mattress: What you need to know
As I’ve said, the REM-Fit Natural contains no foam at all. Starting at the top, you’ll find an English cotton cover, followed by three layers of Hampshire wool to help regulate temperature and wick away moisture. Support is provided by a layer of 1,000 full length pocket springs, with another layer of Hampshire wool underneath these. The REM-Fit Natural is a tufted mattress with hand side stitching, giving it a traditional look and feel – I’ll explain more about that in the ‘Comfort and Performance’ section below. It’s worth noting that the mattress is quite thick: a chunky 28cm high. I’m 5ft 9in and I still felt that I needed to take a little bit of a run-up to get onto it!
Unlike many bed-in-a-box mattresses, including the REM-Fit 600 Lux Elite that I recently reviewed , the Natural arrives flat. Delivery was, as I’ve always found with REM-Fit, well organised: I was given a three-hour delivery window the day before and a phone call update on the day of delivery. The mattress was, thankfully, delivered by a two-man team who took it up to our bedroom. You can also choose to have your old mattress removed, but it will cost you an additional £35.
As the mattress isn’t rolled and doesn’t contain any foam, you’re not going to have any unpleasant off-gassing smell to contend with for the first few days. Instead, there was a tiny bit of a smell from the wool layers in the mattress after I took it out of its plastic covering but that faded in a few hours.
One thing I particularly loved with this mattress was the abundance of handles on all four sides. This makes it easy to rotate, which I’d recommend doing at least every three months to help the surface wear evenly. You’ll get 200 nights to test out the mattress, along with a 15-year guarantee – just make sure you use a mattress protector so there are no marks or stains on the mattress. REM-Fit also donates its returned mattresses to the British Heart Foundation, which I think is a lovely touch.
Price and competition
At full price, a king size REM-Fit Natural will cost you £1,100. But although the mattress had only just been released at the time of testing, REM-Fit was offering a 10% discount, taking the price down to £989.99. The offer also comes with two free pillows, pillow protectors, and a mattress protector. While I suspect the free pillows and protectors won’t always be available, I wouldn’t be surprised if a promotional discount such as this one isn’t regularly offered with the Natural Lux Hybrid.
All-natural mattresses often come with hefty price tags, with brands such as Hypnos and The Woolroom costing thousands of pounds. The REM-Fit Natural’s closest rivals pricewise are probably the mattresses in Simba’s Earth range. The entry-level model, the Simba Earth Source, costs £1,299 RRP for a king, while the premium Earth Apex in the same size is £2,099. Again though, as with REM-Fit’s mattresses, there’s a chance you might be able to get one of these discounted.
Admittedly, the REM-Fit Natural is more expensive than many bed-in-a-box options, no doubt thanks to its natural construction and lack of synthetic materials. The Silentnight Premier Inn 2.0 is one of our current favourite mattresses, costing only £799 in a king size, but it does contain more synthetic materials. The Panda Hybrid Bamboo mattress (at £899 in a king size) might be a more eco-conscious option, using – as the name suggests – ethically sourced bamboo, but it does still have foam layers.
Comfort and performance
REM-Fit describes the feel of the Natural Lux Hybrid as medium firm, and I’d agree with this in general. However, as a lightweight sleeper, it’s worth pointing out that I will always find mattresses firmer than those of a heavier weight. At first, I was slightly concerned that the hand tufted pockets on the top of the mattress might be slightly uncomfortable to sleep on, particularly for those of a lighter weight, but I needn’t have worried. These ‘pockets’ give slightly as you lie on the mattress, with the wool layers providing cushioning before the spring layer kicks in to give you plenty of support.
I think back sleepers in particular will enjoy this mattress, as it offers plenty of support for the lumbar region without any sinkage. I’d also say that average and heavier weight side sleepers will get on with it, but it’s not the best choice for lightweight side sleepers – when I slept on my side I woke up with a little bit of a dead hip. Check out one of the softer options in our best mattresses for side sleepers roundup if you do only sleep in this position. Light and average weight stomach sleepers should also feel supported, with hips kept raised and the spine aligned. But if you’re a heavier weight stomach sleeper, I would probably recommend trying one of the best firm mattresses instead so that you don’t sink too far into the top layers of a mattress.
The support offered by the REM-Fit Natural Lux Hybrid is excellent and I carried out tests to see how far a stack of 2.5kg weights would sink into the mattress. With 10kg of weights on the bed, the mattress sank by 23mm at shoulder height. I was initially a little surprised that the mattress sank this far, because of its firmer feel, but then I remembered the hand tufted design and the softer cushioned pockets on the top of the mattress. Regardless, the Natural Lux Hybrid seems to be firmer than another one of our top rated mattresses, the Simba Hybrid Pro, which sank by 35mm under 10kg. For reference, the Hybrid Pro is also labelled as medium firm.
One of my own personal pet peeves with mattresses is poor edge support. My husband and I share a standard double as we’re both tall and slim (and our bedroom isn’t massive either). But as the mattress is also frequently occupied by space-stealing foster felines, good edge support is vital as we both often find ourselves teetering on said edge. In our tests, the REM-Fit Natural Lux Hybrid actually proved firmer at the edges than at the centre, with 10kg of weights causing it to sink by 21mm. The edges provided plenty of support – both for lying and sitting on. I did notice a little bit of motion transfer on the REM-Fit – that hand tufting means there is a little movement in the top layer, so if you’re a very light sleeper or share your bed with a particularly restless sleeper, this might not be the best fit. However, I don’t think the vast majority of people will notice anything.
My husband is the hot sleeper in this household, and he didn’t find the mattress warm at all – even though we tested it in the middle of summer. I expected this, as the natural materials and springs help to keep air moving through the bed. To look into this further, I also conducted some temperature tests (see our how we test mattresses guide for more details). During the body temperature test, the temperature dropped from 30°C to 21.1°C after a couple of minutes but did rise ever so slightly to 21.5°C after 10 minutes. The heat pad test saw the temperature drop from 50°C to 29.5°C after three minutes, dropping slightly further to 27.4°C after 10 minutes. For context, room temperature was 21°C, so I was impressed with these results. Like the best cooling mattresses, the REM-Fit Natural should do a great job of keeping you cool overnight, mainly thanks to the lack of foam and well-spaced coils that keep air flowing.
Verdict
I’d highly recommend the REM-Fit Natural to a big range of sleepers, with only lightweight side sleepers and heavier stomach sleepers likely to find that it isn’t a great fit. The natural materials also help to make this a good choice for those who sleep hot, with no synthetic foams to trap heat.
Of course, it’s not the cheapest mattress out there but, in the world of natural and organic options, it is incredibly reasonable. And as I mentioned above, there’s a good chance you’ll be able to find it discounted. There’s really not a lot to dislike about this mattress and I think many sleepers will find it both comfortable and supportive.
