Just purchased Pottery Barn pearl "organic" sheet set. IT IS HORRIBLE. When it first arrived, it was love at first sight... beautiful quality so I thought. After washing, I was stunned. These sheets are my worst nightmare. No one, especially millenials, generally spend two-three hours ironing their sheets. These require MORE care. I washed them in warm water, and both air dried and machine dried (slightly damp). THEY ARE A MESS of hard, embedded wrinkles that even a committed ironing person as myself cannot remove. I ironed one pillowcase for 40 min, with top rated spray starch and COULD NOT REMOVE MAJORITY OF WRINKLES. I don't know whether to toss these in the trash or cut them up for rags, but it was a total waste of my hard earned money. Pottery Barn, known for its quality, should be ashamed.

So, as for some of liriodendron's specific points: At the amount that wholesale sheets would cost me and the ease of obtaining them, I don't think I would have to worry much about them wearing at the edges or getting polyester-y. I don't sleep in AC at the timeshare condo in August and the sheets are fine. I sew a lot and making fitted sheets + pillowcases would be trivial for me. You know, I have to admit that part of my motivation for switching to wholesale hotel supply sheets would be that I am sick of the retail sheet industry and would love to stick it to them in my own small way. A sheet is a plain, basic staple of bedding. Everyone I know buys and uses them. They're not inherently a specialty or luxury good. Now, I know that sheets *can* be indulged in as specialty and luxury goods. I know that people *do* make a hobby of learning about bedding fibers and collecting their favorite types. In no way do I have anything against people who want to do those things, but my point is, it shouldn't be necessary for someone who just wants to buy a household staple that won't fall apart or cost them an absurdly inflated price. In order to do this, no one should HAVE to collect esoteric fiber information. Nobody should HAVE to pass along clues by word of mouth as to who makes a decent product this month or year. Nobody should HAVE to scour eBay or find specialty stores to buy a plain, staple household item! The retail sheet industry seems to have done its best to twist and obfuscate facts in order to sell millions of poorly made products with planned obsolescence and few real alternatives. I would love to opt out of their marketing horsepoo and intentionally shoddy goods, and simply never worry about it again. $125 or so every handful of years, even if the sheets wear out faster than I would hope (and I think that rotating between 3-4 sets would do much to extend their lifespans), seems to me like a very small price to pay for that freedom.

Put a thick wool blanket underneath your cotton mattress pad, with percale sheet on top. The wool allows heat (and moisture) to dissipate out from underneath you. It has to a be a thick one, though, for best effect. It does not make you warmer, in the least bit. I use old double-faced blankets, or Hudson's Bay-type ones underneath every mattress pad, on every bed in my household. There were a type of old fashioned percale sheets made before A/C was ubiquitous, intended for use in the summer. Cannon Featherlite was one brand name but there was also a similar line made by Wamsutta. (I am not at home now, or I would look up the name for you.) These are very long staple cotton, with a TC of about 200/220 and very light weight and smooth. I use them in the summer from time to time. They are still available on eBay (NOS) once in a while. Another very cooling sheet material is actually mid-to heavy weight old linen sheets. (That's what I am sleeping under at present during this heat wave in NY, in a farmhouse w/o air conditioning.) New linen sheets are usually a finer weave, so not as comfortable in hot weather to me, plus they cost a fortune. Some people used to use relatively new muslin sheets (TC140-180) for the same purpose as the old linen ones. Cool to be next too, and just enough body and weight so that all you need is the sheet, nothing more. OTOH old muslin that's very well worn isn't as comfortable in hot weather because it becomes very drape-y and can feel almost too soft and clingy. That's because it is made with relatively shorter staple fibers. Muslin sheets also can still be found on eBay, though usually never in sizes for beds larger than a full. Though they are easily seamed to create larger ones. I think the most important thing to choose, however, is a pure, unfinished fabric. Most sheets are covered with synthetic resins to enhance their no-ironing-needed properties. if the sheets are billed as "easy-care", despite being all cotton, they have been treated. Pure finish sheets are usually advertised as such, and often a bit more expensive. (Unless you buy old stock ones on eBay.) Untreated sheets need ironing if dried in a dryer, or hanging outside on a line to dry in order to be flat and smooth after washing. I rarely iron sheets for myself (only for guests), but all of my sheets are line dried. I do iron pillowcases, though. Also, I sleep on fresh sheets every night in hot weather. It may be just be psychological trick, but it always seems cooler to get into fresh sheets, and usually if you start out feeling cool, you'll sleep better and longer no matter what the temp. HTH L.

No great loss, AFAIC - the one nearest me (about 35 minutes away) was/is always grubby, disorganized, and the employees were always surly, like they were doing you this huge favor by doing anything whatsoever for you. The only nearby competition is really TJMaxx, Penneys has a miniscule home section. There's a BB&B about 10 minutes away from me now and the store is always clean, well-lit, reasonably well organized and if the employees aren't terribly knowledgeable (high proportion of students from the nearby university) they're at least apologetic if they're clueless. Plus, the LNT here wouldn't accept expired coupons, even by one day, and I swear the stars and planets had to be in the right conjunction for them to take a BB&B coupon (which also couldn't be expired), while I've used 5 year old BB&B coupons - got a big stack on Freecycle - and expired LNT coupons at BB&B with no fuss whatsoever. We have to go to the Maul (yes, that spelling is intentional) this weekend because DH is in dire need of some new pants for work and I'm curious to see how many empty storefronts there are. I haven't been there in about three months. It does suck about the job losses, though. I learned about two layoffs of people close to me just this week, both with no notice at all. Just "here's your final check and the phone number for the unemployment office, now go". It's a downward spiral - get laid off, can't afford to buy anything that isn't the bare necessities, more companies go out of business because their sales are in the toilet and lay their people off, then they can't afford to buy stuff... restaurants are already closing right and left here, including one of our favorites. :-( An acquaintance who works for a car dealership (administrative staff, not sales) has been warned to start job-hunting now because despite discounts and rebates they've sold one car in the last 30 days so layoffs will be inevitable within the next couple of weeks, and unless there's a huge increase in sales the dealership may close by the end of the year.