Swan Down Pillows (36 Photos): The Pros And Cons Of Artificial And Natural Filler, What Is It, How To Dry

2024 Author: Beatrice Philips | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-01-18 12:09

Real swan down is a very expensive material, so pillows and blankets made from this filler are sometimes quite expensive and therefore are not actually available to ordinary people.

But thanks to modern technologies, manufacturers present today to consumers a very popular artificial filler "swan's down", which has excellent quality characteristics and a very reasonable price, and bedding made from it is no worse than products from natural raw materials.

Pros and cons

Any material, no matter whether it is synthetic or natural, has its advantages and disadvantages. Synthetic fluff is also no exception here, and its daily use has both positive and negative aspects. Product advantages:

• Such pillows will appeal to people who are prone to allergic reactions or people with very delicate skin.
• Artificial fiber is not a good medium for the development of various bacteria, so you will never find fungus or dust mites in such a pillow.
• Pillows made of such fluff are almost weightless, but at the same time they are quite elastic, keep their shape well, the fluff in them never gets lost and does not crumple over time.
• It is very easy to care for such products - they can be machine washed and do not need special conditions for long-term storage.
• The fluff in these accessories will not pick up unpleasant odors and will not smell.
• This filler dries very quickly.
• These pillows will keep you warm.

• High-quality air exchange in any product made of swan down.
• The fabric cover will easily hold the down and will not allow it to come out of the product.
• Synthetic swan fluff is much cheaper than natural fluff.
• Airiness and light weight. You will immediately appreciate the airiness of the sleeping pillows.
• Due to its complete safety, such a filler can be used in children's products.
• The structure of the filler allows the production of pillows in various shapes and sizes.
• Long service life - up to 5 years with good care.

7 pictures

There are not so many drawbacks to sleeping devices made from this popular material:

• Swan down absorbs moisture, so this pillow is not suitable for laymen who often sweat while sleeping.
• May cause human overheating if used in a warm room.
• It can absorb electricity and therefore sometimes requires treatment with an antistatic agent.

Dimensions (edit)

Before choosing the most suitable pillow for yourself, you need to find out exactly what sizes you can find for these products. In this case, you need to rely not only on your taste preferences, but also on the size of the pillowcases in the set of your own bed linen.

A standard pillow cannot be longer than the width of the mattress if it is a single bed or two pillows cannot be greater than the width of the bed on which two sleep. High-quality products in their height cannot be wider than the standard shoulder of an adult - 14-15 cm.

Good sleeping products are usually rectangular or square shaped. Sometimes you can still see pillows measuring 700x700 mm, but today they are almost supplanted by models measuring 500x700 mm, as well as 400x600 mm and pillows in the form of squares 500x500 mm, 400x400 mm.

Most Russian manufacturers have recently begun to take an example from European standards and produce mostly pillows with dimensions of 50x70 cm.

Materials (edit)

Real fluff are collected by hand from the breast or abdomen of adult swans, usually in the season of habitual molting of these noble birds. The quality indicators of natural fluff depend on the specific species of swans.

Only 30-40 grams of down is removed from one bird (therefore, the main mass of the natural filler is feather). Cosmetic puffs are made from natural swan down, and household items or warm down jackets are very expensive. Buying fake down helps protect your living environment.

An original down pillow is produced according to a certain technology: the down is broken into “compartments” so that the product can be quickly restored, or such a sleeping device consists of a number of layers at once: there is a hard layer under the neck, and a soft layer under the back of the head. In the outer rows there is mainly soft down, in the inner rows there is a mixture of feathers and down.

Absorbing any kind of moisture, the down pillow cannot dry out on its own, and therefore dust mites can constantly start in it.

Synthetic down is a practical, versatile material . The principle of its manufacture is very simple. In the process of making such fluff, thin microfibers are obtained. They are spirally rolled up and additionally treated with silicone for better durability and increased consumer qualities.

For the production of such fluff, polyester fiber is taken - it can be obtained using a compound where there are many basic acids. At the same time, noble birds do not lose anything and the usual manual labor, which is seriously involved in assembling swan down, is significantly saved.

The finished products are dense and elastic, since the appearance of the fibers obtained does not allow them to come out through the textiles on the seam line

Ready-made devices for sleeping with such material have a whole range of properties necessary to create maximum comfort for the layman during sleep and during rest. At the same time, pillows with an inner material made of synthetic down are both externally and to the touch very similar to products made from natural raw materials. Of no small importance is the material from which the pillow cover is made.

Choose textiles that will be pleasant to you, which will allow the skin to breathe efficiently and will help to wick moisture away from the body. In terms of composition, it must necessarily be a natural fabric: cotton, linen, silk, woolen.

Each of the listed fabrics has its own positive qualities:

• cotton - soft, hypoallergenic, cheap and easy-to-care material, and although linen does not have a soft surface, it is just great for hot weather;
• silk gentle enough and very pleasant to the touch, very useful for the skin, but too whimsical to care for and requires delicate handling. Woolen fabric can warm the body, relieve headaches, but it requires certain products for quality care.

When choosing a material for a pillowcase, it is important not only the raw material itself, from which this material will be created, but also the type of weaving of the thread bases, that is, the very type of fabric is important. For down, you must use a dense pillowcase so that small downy feathers do not pass through it.

It is for this reason that it is customarily used as the base of the cover. cotton teak , since this material has the most dense texture and a decent thread thickness. Not a feather bed will slip through the teak, and such a dense fabric will give a stable shape for a light down pillow.

It is very important that such a dense fabric not only preserves the fluff inside the product, but also prevents dust from getting into the pillow - after all, sometimes it is difficult to wash a product out of fluff.

Teak does an excellent job of keeping the fluff in the case: tightly woven threads will not let in fluff or dust. At the same time, like all other fabrics made of cotton materials, teak is pleasant to the touch, hygroscopic and helps the skin to breathe calmly.

Manufacturers

A fairly large number of domestic companies are engaged in mass production of high-quality swan down pillows, which are in great demand among consumers of various ages.

Company " ArtDesign "offers soft and warm products called "Artpostel" made of fake swan down with a pillowcase made of 100% teak. The company also manufactures synthetic fiber cuffs.

• Company " Textile " produces pillows, the quality of the filling of which corresponds to the real down material. The company uses advanced technological principles for the processing of down fibers and produces a quick-drying fabric as a cover.
• Company " Fleece " in addition to a wide selection of various bedding sets, it presents pillows of the Atlantis series, which have an orthopedic effect. The cover of the product is made of natural cotton. This pillow uses contour stitching, which will give you maximum comfort and wellness sleep.
• Textile company " Adele " from Ivanovo presents down pillows of the Avangard series. These products look great, do not absorb unpleasant odors, and are quite elastic.

• Company " Ecotex " known for its products under the trade mark "Swan's Pooh". Its factories use a state-of-the-art microfiber called DownFill to make pillows. The napernik consists of 100% cotton linen (percale).
• A manufacturer with a bright name " Pilushkino " introduces products called Snow. Microfibre is used as an inner material, and the pillowcase contains 100% cotton. These pillows are suitable for both adults and children.
• Down and feather firm " Agro-Don " manufactures down pillows in the form of siliconized hollow threads. Such a product weighs 1.5 kg. Pillow "Lady Lel" from the same manufacturer will provide comfort during dreams and rest thanks to the "memory effect", with the help of which it will repeat the shape of the neck, shoulders and head of the sleeping person.

• Pillows from the manufacturer " Batuk-textile " suitable for ordinary people with problems of the cervical vertebrae. The company promises the volume and elasticity of the inner material, quick restoration of the shape of the product, many sizes, hypoallergenicity.
• Down pillow from a trading house " Bagheera " made of synthetic material that resembles real fluff. The cover is made from 100% cotton fabrics. You can also order models from jacquard material.

How to choose?

First of all, when choosing a good pillow, you need to pay attention to its pillowcase. Despite the excellent characteristics of the inner material, the sleeping device may not be of very good quality if its cover is made of synthetic materials. It is for this reason that really good products have a cover made of coarse calico and satin.

The height of the product can be of particular importance. It must be chosen, keeping in mind the position in which you most often sleep.

If you sleep mostly on your side, then it is best to take the product higher, but if you like to sleep on your back, then you need to choose a low product. For those people who change their position all the time, it is best to choose something average or sleep with two pillows at once - both with medium and low.

If you decide to buy a new pillow for yourself, when choosing a product in the store, you need to hold it in your own hands, while relying on your sensations from touch, so that later you will be as comfortable and pleasant as possible to sleep on the chosen model.

The quality of sewing is also important, because uneven stitches, crooked stitches, speak eloquently about the low quality of the product. Excellent cushions along the entire length have either a double-stitched seam on the outside, or a seam with a decorative tape sewn between the two edges of the fabric on the inside to make it much stronger.

All characteristics of the product should be listed on the product label: what fabric the cover is made of, the full composition of its filler, its weight, and not the weight of the product itself, information on how to care for the product and data on the country of origin will be posted here.

Very often, the name of the company that produces the product influences the choice of a down product.

You can even distinguish a responsible pillow manufacturer by the appearance of the product. The pillow should have high-quality packaging, most often it is an individual strong plastic bag. This is the only way to be sure that this product was transported and stored with high quality. Also, under normal conditions, this will help to preserve the excellent appearance and clean appearance of the product without any problems.

The service life of a sleep device made of synthetic filler, subject to all operating conditions, safety and care, is 5-6 years

How to care?

Pillows filled with synthetic swan down are easy to care for. They are advised to ventilate them as often as possible on the street or on the balcony. And if such a need arises, then these products will perfectly survive both washing and rinsing in a washing machine.

The most important condition in this case is the choice of a delicate wash mode and setting the temperature to no more than 40 degrees. You should also know that it is strictly forbidden to use bleaching agents for washing products made of noble down, the component of which is chlorine.

Synthetic fluff does not like high temperatures and close sources of direct fire, for this reason it is best to dry the product naturally - on a rope outside.

Experts allow to squeeze things out of the fluff in a centrifuge . The fluff is only "afraid" of really aggressive types of bleaching agents, as they can disrupt the structure of its microfiber.

After washing, you need to shake the item well so that the fluff does not turn into lumps. When storing down products in vacuum transparent bags, their shape does not suffer at all.

This video will show you how to machine wash down pillows.