Buyers Guide

Know your fabric compositions from your percale or sateen weaves? Learn about the finishes, fabric and techniques we use to design our luxury sheets

Thread count has become something of a buzz word to describe luxury, but a high thread count alone is no assurance of quality. The choice of yarn right through to the finishing process also play a huge role in determining your bed linen’s final character.

Thread count refers to the number of threads in a square inch of cloth and can make the difference between jumping into bed with crisp linen or silky, luxurious sheets. Linen can range from 120 to over 1,000, but biggest isn’t always best and a very high thread count can feel stiff and unsupple. So, unless you have skin thicker than an armadillo, we suggest buying linen in a thread count that’s right for you.

Watch out! Linen with a high thread count can indicate that multiple yarns have been twisted together to artificially bump up the thread count number. All our linen is crafted using the finest, high quality single thread.

We love all our linen but if we had to choose a favourite, it would be our 400 thread-count bed linen. Rigorously road tested by 5* hotels, it offers the best balance between luxury and resilience. What’s your favourite linen? Find Your Perfect Match below.

Find out if your linen is more low quality than hotel luxury with this basic test:

Step 1: Hold the linen up to a light source and see how light filters through the weave. Uneven patches of light can suggest poor quality spinning and a weaker linen.

Step 2: Drape the linen across your hand and look across its surface. Hairy or fluffy linen won’t have been ‘singed’, a high quality finishing process that results in a soft, smooth finish.

Step 3: Inspect the linen for stray flecks of coloured thread or yarn. These shouldn’t be present in any high quality products and can suggest an inferior product.

Creating a sleep sanctuary for your home should be a pleasure not a chore, but we know it can get confusing. With over 70 years of experience in luxury textiles our industry experts will help you choose what’s right for you with our online masterclass. Sleep better knowing you are making the right investment in your over-all wellbeing.

Simply nothing compares to the look and feel of pure cotton bed linen, which is why we don’t sell anything else. Durable, easy to launder and breathable, our sateen and percale bed sheets, duvet covers and pillowcases are made using the finest quality single-ply fabric giving them a natural beauty and luxe factor that 5* hotels love.

Our single-ply fabric is woven using a single thread with long staple cotton fibres. This soft, strong single ply relies on high quality yarn that doesn’t need twisting with another thread to strengthen it, creating gorgeous durability, softness and quality.

Our journey to supplying you with tielle love luxury linen begins by selecting the finest quality yarn. These fibres are then artfully spun and woven at family-owned mills. All our quality controlled suppliers are chosen for their high standards and commitment to building ethical, sustainable businesses that benefit everyone, not just a privileged few. This gives you the confidence of knowing that every tielle product not only looks great, but does good too.

Choose a pillowcase you’ll fall in love, and asleep, with by knowing what thread count, fabric and weave you need to create the bed of your dreams. You’ll also want a generously sized case that doesn’t squash or squeeze the pillow in any way as this will affect its performance. All our pillowcases are purposefully oversized to allow for natural shrinkage of 5-8% when washed for the first time.

Just as Goldilocks wanted her porridge ‘just right’, apply the same principle when buying a duvet for your home. A duvet with the right fill and tog rating will leave you neither ‘too hot’ nor ‘too cold,’ and help you boost your health and well-being by creating an environment conducive to a good night’s sleep.

Opt for a lower tog if buying a children’s duvet or baby bedding.

Feathers contain small quills that give duvets that snug, tucked-in feeling and pillows a firmer feel. Plumper and heavier than pure down, our hotel quality Savoy duvet combines high-quality feather and duck down for ultimate luxury and weight.

Scarcer than feather, down is one of the world’s best insulating materials and comes from the breast of ducks and geese. Luxuriously soft and fluffy, it offers warmth without weight due to the way the big down clusters trap air.

Europe has a long tradition of raising geese that are more mature, resulting in higher grades of down. Our light, soft and supremely comfortable Goose Down duvets and pillows can provide more lightweight, all-season warmth than Duck Down and are naturally breathable.

Synthetic duvets are often considered inferior to natural duvets, but a hotel quality microfibre duvet can feel just like the real thing. Warm, soft and supremely light, 100% microfibre duvets are anti-allergy with the drape of a luxury natural duvet. Natural duvets and pillows encased in a high thread count, dust mite proof outer shell also keep dust mite at bay.

The tog rating and filling affect the weight and warmth of a duvet. The higher the tog rating, the warmer the duvet.

A 10.5 tog duvet provides perfect all year round comfort. Most hotels use a natural filled 10.5 tog duvet to get the right weight, look and feel for their hotel and to create a fabulous night’s sleep for their guests.

For hot summer nights, a good quality 4.5 tog down or luxury microfibre duvet is ideal.

The weight of a duvet varies depending on the filling. If you like a heavier duvet that gives you a tucked-in, cocoon-like feeling opt for one with a higher feather content. If you prefer lighter duvets with the same warmth, a pure down duvet is for you.

Gone are the days when you’d wake to find the filling at the bottom of the duvet. All our natural duvets are hand filled and hemmed into equally sized squares filled with the down or feathers, before undergoing a hand finishing process. This helps to ensure even distribution and a perfect drape.

1. Be picky: Just as one shoe size doesn’t fit all, neither does one pillow. Consider your sleep needs and personal preferences, then invest in the best quality pillow you can.

2. Check the fill: Not all down and feather is equal, and the quality of a pillow’s fill is just as important as the % of down. Most people prefer a mix of feathers and down as this gives more structure and support than pure down, while still being skin soft.

3. Buy to last: A good quality pillow will plump up and retain its shape for longer. Take the pillow test to find out if a pillow needs replacing by placing the pillow over your arm. If it sags in the middle, upgrade. A new pillow will always be plumper than a five year old one.

4. Get the right support: A pillow’s firmness or softness is determined by the quality of the pillow’s fill, not just by the % of down. We recommend that you buy one, sleep on it, then buy the rest for the bed once you’re happy.

5. Be allergy aware: Think you’re allergic to natural fill pillows? Clean, high quality feather and down encased in mite-proof, double-stitched casing ensures no feather or down can escape. Synthetic pillows also hold more bedbugs than natural fills and many more people react to bedbugs than feathers according to clinical research.

Turkish cotton is a premium long staple cotton from the Aegean region that has extra-long fibres. This high quality cotton helps make our towels and towel bale sets strong, absorbent and silk-like to touch.

GSM stands for grams per square metre and is a measurement of weight. The higher the GSM, the heavier the towelling will be. However, you wouldn’t want a towel that’s the same weight as a bath mat. Our 650gsm towels strike an optimum balance between practicality and luxury, providing the longevity, fluffiness and absorbency 5* hotel clients demand.

Combed cotton is softer than cotton that hasn’t been combed. The process involves straightening the yarns and removing the short length fibres to make the cotton softer, more durable and less prone to fraying and tearing.

White towels have an inherent sense of cleanliness. When laundered correctly they will also stay white. If you need to add a bit of pizzazz to your bathroom, consider colourful accessories and bathroom paints instead.

All our towels and robes are generously proportioned with up to 5% shrinkage built into the cut. This gives the towelling a plush feel typical of high end hotels.

Cotton provides the best absorbency for bath robes, but choosing between a velour or waffle robe is largely a matter of personal choice. A good quality velour bathrobe will cocoon you in comfort, whereas a lightweight waffle bathrobe is ideal for summer and spas. Both our waffle and velour robes are popular with luxury hotels.

The quality of the yarn is just as important as the gsm. Find out more about towel quality in our How To Series.

Excessive heat damages fibres and makes towels stiff. To keep towels and robes soft, air dry where possible to keep the fibres fluffed up. If using a tumble dryer:

Follow the standard washing instructions for bed linen and use the ‘cool down’ cycle of the tumble dryer ten minutes before the end to allow fibres to relax.

Follow the standard washing instructions for bed linen. See Caring For Your Pieces.

Fabric softener coats towelling fibres with a thin layer of chemicals which reduces absorbency – exactly what you don’t want from a towel.

Damp towels are a breeding ground for bacteria. Dry towels between use and wash them in the hot cycle of your washing machine. Ours can be washed at 60°C.

Keep your toddler safe and snug with a lightweight duvet and linen that’s the perfect fit. For extra snuggle-factor, add a fluffy anti-allergen pillow and super-soft blanket for hours of blissful sleep.

Wriggly sleepers will benefit from a fitted sheet that won’t ruffle or come away from the mattress at night. Choose soft and breathable cotton sheets with deep corners that slide over the cot bed with ease. Find out more about what makes great cotton.

Cot beds are larger than a cot, but smaller than a single bed. To avoid overheating, use a lightweight duvet that’s tailored to fit a standard cot bed, and top with a blanket on colder days. All our children’s bedding sets contain a duvet and pillow with a refluffable, hygienic filling that prevents the build-up of dust mites, fungi and bacteria. Find out more about our anti-allergen Dacron® Comforel® Allerban bedding.

When you buy a Tiny Tielle product you’re supporting children around the world. Our work with The Citizen Foundation (TCF)in Pakistan helps to make basic education accessible to all, regardless of sex, class or background. Find out more on our From Field to Bed page.

Note: We don’t sell newborn bedding sets as duvets and pillows are not recommended for standard cots and cribs. Follow expert guidance for baby bedding safety.