Do You Need a Top Sheet with a Duvet Cover?
At Royal Egyptian Bedding, we recommend that you protect your duvet or comforter with one of our luxurious duvet covers. These covers, available in both Egyptian cotton and bamboo cotton, feature the same elegance, rich colors, and supple textures as our resort-quality bed sheet sets.
But people often wonder: Do you need a top sheet with a duvet cover? Aren’t they redundant?
The answer is that it is usually a good idea to have both. Top sheets and duvet covers serve different roles: A duvet cover is for protecting the duvet itself, while the purpose of a top sheet is part of the core bedding that is intended to be in direct contact with your body. By using both, you can enjoy the freshest bedding for the least amount of work.
Top Sheets Are More Hygienic
Another way of thinking about the question “Do you need a top sheet with a duvet cover?” is to ask: Do you like sleeping in a clean bed?
The most important purpose of a top sheet is hygiene. Beds are a breeding ground for bacteria because of the dirt on our bodies and the oils and moisture secreted by our skin.
By having a fitted sheet below you and a flat sheet on top of you, these two sheets act like underclothes: They catch most of the filth from our bodies, slowing it down from reaching into other layers such as the duvet or mattress pad.
Top Sheets Save You Work and Money
Do you need a top sheet with a duvet cover? If you like cutting down on chores, the answer is a definite yes.
Without a top sheet to form a hygienic barrier, your duvet cover will get dirty instead. That means you’ll have to change your duvet cover every week or so for washing. Changing a duvet cover is a lot more work than changing a top sheet.
With a top sheet, you can likely go for a month or even two months between changing your duvet cover.
Top Sheets Need to Be Tucked Properly
Sometimes the question “Do you need a top sheet with a duvet cover?” is really just an indirect complaint about top sheets in general. One of people’s most common problems with top sheets is that the sheets can get untucked and wad up over the course of the night.
However, this usually only happens when the sheets were not tucked correctly in the first place. If you make your bed properly, the top sheet will stay firmly in place. In fact, this is actually a lesser-known purpose of a top sheet: If the top sheet holds in place, then any blankets or comforters above it will also hold in place while you sleep, instead of drifting to one edge of the bed or wadding up.
If you want your blankets to stay in place, a top sheet with a duvet cover is the answer.
Another common complaint is that top sheets are too tight and take away from the softness of a fluffy duvet. However, this can be completely fixed by adding some slack to the sheet.
How to Tuck a Top Sheet the Right Way
Once you learn how to tuck a top sheet properly, you’ll never need to ask “Do you need a top sheet with a duvet cover?” again.
- When you change your sheets, lay the top sheet so that it hangs at least four to six inches below the bottom of your mattress at the foot of the bed. Tuck all of this material underneath the mattress itself (and the fitted sheet), folding the corners as you would wrap a gift box in order to achieve a neat look. The more material you tuck, the better your top sheet will hold in place all through the night.
- Next, give the top sheet between six to twelve inches of slack instead of pulling it tight at the head of the bed. You can leave all the slack at the foot and pleat it for a cleaner look. This slack will give your feet plenty of room, and will also prevent the top sheet from reducing the softness of the duvet.
These proper folding techniques require some extra material in the sheet. That is why all of our top sheets at REB are generously cut, giving you lots of extra material to tuck below the mattress. Most of our flat sheets are between 94 and 102 inches long.
Find Your New Favorite Luxury Bedding Styles at REB
So, do you need a top sheet with a duvet cover? While you can certainly get by without using one (or the other), the purpose of a top sheet and the purpose of a duvet cover are not the same. This means that the easier and more hygienic option is to use both together.
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