Habitat Furnishings

     I got a call today from a woman who really wanted to buy an all Natural Latex bed, and she’d been to every online store and every retailer in her city, but felt uncomfortable about the information she had received, being quite confused and frustrated. By the time she got to me, I think she was pretty worn out. Having slept on a Natural Latex bed years ago, she knew what she was looking for, but could never figure out how the raw liquid latex was made into a solid, how it was transformed from a white thick liquid into a highly elastic and flexible solid…and what was with all of those holes in the finished Latex mattress? No one could seem to give her a solid answer, so I helped her out.

I told her that the reason for the holes in the mattress was quite straightforward. Natural latex needs the pincore holes, as they are called, to increase flexibility of the material, so it does not tear when rolled or handled. This adds a tremendous ventilation quality, too, that keeps the material bone dry, and thus providing all of the wonderful qualities like the inability for Natural Latex to harbor dust mites, mold, mildew, fungi, and bacterial organisms. True, there are some organic properties of Natural Latex, like its pH (level of acidity) that ward off these organisms, but keeping the material dry is by far the greatest contributor.

The pincore holes are built into the mold, looking like very long spikes, around which the liquid latex is vulcanized (“slow cooked”) in the metal mold, which is really quite like a gigantic waffle iron, leaving its imprint on the finished product. Ever made Belgian waffles or pancakes? Very similar process. Just don’t burn them, or they quickly become brittle, black, and highly inedible.

There are basically 5 steps in the Dunlop method of vulcanization that is used in our Natural Latex conversion from botanical liquid to semi-solid.

1. Compounding  is the step where all of the liquid latex is combined into a large vessel just prior to pouring into the mold. The liquid is filtered to remove any particulate matter, like you would sift flour before baking.

2. Foaming and Gelling is the next step, where the liquid latex is frothed much like whipping cream, to incorporate as much air into the mixture as possible. The trick with the Dunlop method is to froth thoroughly (you know, the highest setting on the blender so to speak) so the mixture does not settle while in the mold still liquified.

3. Vulcanization is the next step, where the liquid latex has been poured into the mold, and is slow cooked so that the process from liquid to flexible “semi-solid” takes place. The heat applied is significant enough to “set” the material, remove the water, while at the same time, not scorching it..you know, again like a well cooked pancake.

4. Washing involves the vulcanized, now solid piece of Natural Latex being thoroughly rinsed to remove residual microscopic powdery latex proteins from the finished mattress core. Our production uses drinkable water to rinse the mattresses. During this process they are also repeatedly squeezed like a giant sponge, wrung out, rinsed, then wrung out again. The rinsing process makes the Natural Latex virtually hypoallergenic, and people with Latex allergies very rarely have any response while using our mattress (though we do advise doing a rub test, and when you purchase a mattress from us, we send you a piece before your mattress arrives to do this if you like). Once rinsed, the Natural Latex core is pristine, purified, and is 100% Natural Latex, botanically derived.

5. Drying is the final step before packaging and shipping, and involves passing the Natural Latex mattress cores through what looks like a gian pizza oven, only with high velocity moving air that is dry and warm, to remove any remaining water. After this step, the process is complete, and the mattress is ready for use!

      Many of my customers do a lot of research before they purchase a Natural Latex mattress. One of the problems is finding an online store like us who actually carries a genuine Natural Latex, and isn’t calling it Natural Latex when what they are really selling is a blend of Natural and synthetic latex. To be sure, I always advise people to ask questions, like “where is your Natural Latex collected?”, and if they can’t answer basic questions like that, most likely you’re dealing with synthetic latex. By the time customers get to us, a lot of times, they’re exhausted and completely confused, having been to twenty web sites, each of which has their own proprietary spin on their bed being the best. How do you distill all of this information down, so you can make a logical choice, and how do you know you’re going to get all Natural material?

One of the most commonly asked questions we get, is “What is the Talalay method, and what is the difference between the Talalay method and the Dunlop method?”, the latter method being the process we use with our Natural Latex , turning it from liquid into solid form.  Talalay latex gets its name from the Talalay brothers who in the 1950s, created and then perfected a new method for manufacturing latex foam, taking the raw, hand collected, liquid material, and converting into the solid state. The process was based on first expanding the latex foam to fill a mould by sucking out all of the air after a small amount of “frothy” liquid latex was added, momentarily freezing it to capture and suspend the bubbles so they did not settle, and then gelling it with carbon dioxide gas to lock everything in place. Supposedly, the end result would be a product with lower density, coupled with greater uniformity and consistency. And indeed, the end product is quite unique, but it is significantly softer than natural Dunlop method latex, I think, and some folks find it not as elastic. The best application for Talalay Natural Latex is to use it as a top layer, not a support layer, where Dunlop method latex is more resilient and elastic and better as the “superstructure” layer.

I’ve been on dozens of latex beds at shows and in stores, and I have to be honest, I don’t really understand why many folks seem to get caught up in the process rather than the product. I really believe each is unique, and as long as you are getting all natural, not synthetic, Talalay or Dunlop, and preferably no blends, you will have completely detached yourself from using a sleep surface that is derived from a petroleum product with potential off gassing, smells, and fume issues.

The real downside, though,  is that the Talalay method often is found in the maketplace as a blend of some Natural Latex, but mostly synthetic, petroleum based latex. It’s a whole lot cheaper to make, and a whole lot more profitable for the manufacturer who makes it. Ask a lot of questions when buying any latex bedding. Ask specifically, “Is it all natural, all botanical?”

For a really good reliable one layer, firmer, more supportive Natural Latex mattress,  the Dunlop method is simple, consistent, and has been time tested for 50 years. Natural Latex rubber mattresses were commonplace in the U.S. before cheaper, synthetic foams became available to the bedding industry, and many customers I speak to have Natural Latex beds in their homes or their parents homes, and are amazed at how resilient, elastic, and flexible these beds are even after decades. The Talalay method is new, not as time tested, and not as much information is available on the long term lifespan of this material as there is on the 50 year old Dunlop technique. But the material does make an unbeatable topper or finish layer for a really cushy, softer latex mattress..if it is Natural Talalay. Like anything else, ask for it by name!

When I compare our Dunlop mattresses side by side with a Talalay bed, to me it so obvious, the main observation being that you tend to sink more in the Talalay material, vs. the Dunlop Natural material, which keeps you suspended if you will, on top of the mattress. Side sleepers especially seem to respond better to the Dunlop method since when you apply a lot of weight to the latex in a limited area (imagine side sleeping being like a knife on edge, vs. a belly or back sleeper, where the weight is more evenly distributed), the pressure point reduction and weight distributing qualities of the latex being clearly superior. You don’t bottom out on it, and you can easily turn from side to side effortlessly. This is important when you consider that a common complaint of memory foam users, and a few Talalay process mattress owners I have spoken with, say that the sinking effects of this materials cause you to feel like your stuck in a rut, and you can actually wake up as your body fights to wrestle its way out of the sinkhole in your bed.

We have found again and again, that the Dunlop vulcanization method, basically involving a thorough whipping and frothing of the liquid latex to evenly disperse the air bubbles, is the better choice for comfort, but the only choice if you intend to buy a 100% all Natural Latex mattress. The Dunlop method uses a kind of gentle, “slow cook” heating process to solidify the latex, sealing in the wonderfully elastic and resilient qualities that you are looking for.

      Many of my customers call seeking information about Natural Latex, already having some seasoned experience and knowledge base about this unique, botanically derived  material. In fact, I talk to lots of folks who have actually slept on a Natural Latex mattress decades ago, many remembering the wonderfully comfortable, elastic, and supportive bed their Mom and Dad had in their house that was most likely a Sears product, like their Harvest House line of natural latex mattresses.

In the 50’s, natural latex rubber mattresses were hugely popular, and even most automotive seating upholstery was done with latex rubber. By the mid 60’s however, cheaper, synthetic, petroleum based urethane foam was taking the place of natural latex in the bedding industry, and automobile manufacturers wanted something lighter in weight as well, since natural latex rubber is much more dense.  Soon, synthetic foams dominated  the bedding industry since they were cheap, light weight, and you could control the composition in such a way that different densities and unique aesthetic qualities could be created and controlled.

Memory foam products are a good example of a material that has dominated the bedding industry for the last few years, with manufacturers playing up on it’s body enveloping, “melt up around you” sensation as being the best way to obtain proper spine alignment and receive “restorative sleep” benefits. Also, since NASA pioneered the development of this foam, customers liked the idea of anything romantically linked to space technology.

Unfortunately, petroleum based foams tend to have some downsides, and with the current global mindset about oil derived products in general, the interest in greener, naturally derived products is undergoing a huge renaissance, and consumers are becoming more tuned in to chemical sensitivity and exposure to substances which are built into their sleep surfaces, and complaints are commonplace. I speak to medical professionals who call inquiring about natural latex, and there is genuine concern about these issues. Previously undiagnosed illnesses such as Fibromyalgia, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, and others are now being more thoroughly understood as having at least some connection to environmental factors, and consumers want to eliminate any materials in their immediate living spaces, including bedding, that can expose them to substances which may be contributing to symptoms associated with these disorders.

I’ve personally spoken with dozens of folks who have been diagnosed suffering from vague syndromes like fibromyalgia or severe allergies, who start from scratch first by adjusting their diets, the air quality in their homes (who do you know that does not have some kind of an air filtration system in their home?), their beds, even the paint on the walls and the carpet on their floors. Bottom line, their is a huge, conscious movement underway motivating humans to cleanse their living environments, all in concert with bigger issues like global warming, and the tendency to move away from products made from oil.  I’m not saying that we’re trying to capitalize on a “tree hugger” image, and we don’t all wear Birkenstocks  here, but the fact of the matter is, there’s not a lot of research about the effects of long term, intimate contact with bedding materials, especially those manufactured using petroleum distillates.

Especially alarming is the use of VOC based adhesives in the bedding industry, and consumers are becoming increasingly aware of the use of these materials. Customers for years have voiced concerns to me about the ingredients in mattresses, about such things as the “cumulative effect” of exposure to noxious materials, what with our seemingly endless need to create ever more sophisticated beds with all kinds of layers, all of which have to be glued together, in attempt to create the most innovative, high tech mattress in the marketplace. I’m surprised that some manufacturers don’t include a stepladder with their mattress, to be honest with you.

Other problems with synthetic, oil based foams, including synthetic latex, is longevity. Natural latex, for example, does not depress, form body impressions, or rut over time, because of its high elasticity quality, its open celled stucture, and its stability. Urethane or oil based foams eventually turn yellow, become brittle, and begin to bucket or rut, even very early on. I have received many calls from customers who have become highly frustrated after purchasing a mattress and within months, body impressions have caused them to literally roll into the center of their mattress, where they become “trapped”!

When searching for true, 100% natural latex, you have to dig pretty deep, as the “latex scam” we talk about on our site, really does hold water. Many retailers pass off “100% Latex” as Natural, when in fact it’s nothing more than 100% synthetic urethane, and it has no botanical component to it at all. Others provide blended product, a mixture of some natural botanical material mixed with synthetic urethane foam, and call it “All Natural”. You have to ask a lot of questions…like, exactly where does your natural latex come from? There are few sources for botanical latex, most of it produced in Asia on large plantations, the cores, or layers of raw mattress components shipped to the U.S., and then final assembly and customized lamination and packaging done here, in various production facilities.

So, what is it about 100% Natural Latex, the botanical version that makes it…so green? It just so happens that natural latex, while being as pristine as a spring day to humans, is a completely undesirable environment for dust mites, bacteria, mold, mildew, fungi, even certain viruses and other microbes. This is largely due to the dry environment within the “open celled” structure of natural latex, and without moisture, these organisms cannot colonize. Also, there is some suggestion that the pH, or acidity, of natural latex, may also be a natural inhibitor. Natural latex has no odor, and since it is a botanical product, does not leach out vapors or fumes over long periods of time. More specifically, when you purchase a latex mattress made using the Dunlop method, the rinsing process used after  the vulcanization process is complete (vulcanization is the “slow cooking” process which turns the raw liquid latex into a solid) utilizes pure, drinkable quality water, which removes proteins and other dusty residuals which eliminate allergens. Therefore, people who have latex allergies can safely enjoy the comfort of a natural latex mattress.

We source our latex from a private company which obtains our product from Sri Lanka, and an overview of the production process can be seen here, at the Latex Green web site. If you’re looking for all natural latex, remember that it’s really been around for a long time, and when you think about it, to have access to a time tested method of production (the Dunlop method, not the Talalay process, more on that in other blog entries found here) is pretty amazing. Botanical latex has been used in bedding and other industries in the U.S. for almost 60 years..more than almost any other bedding component in existence. Now that’s some serious field testing!

     Being in the retail side of the bedding business for almost fifteen years exposes you to some pretty amazing things. I started out in the futon business, at a time when futons had become more mainstream, and when Americans began to embrace the futon sofabed as comfortable, stylish, affordable, and even nostalgic..many folks who thought of their futon as something you threw into the dumpster behind your dorm after college, remembered it as being their sanctuary, a place where you could sleep for fourteen hours after being awake for four days. You could eat on it, hang out with friends on it, and you threw it into the back of your car and travelled with it, your futon, your cinderblock bookshelves, and your Hefty bags filled with all of your earthly possessions. I quickly developed two very busy stores, and then ultimately a web based store, to sell the softgoods and accessories that went along with the futon sofabeds we sold.

As time went on, customers who had become friends began to ask about other bedding alternatives, and since I was keenly interested in finding out what the next bed dujour might be, and, worrying that futons would sort of drift into history, I paid attention. Soon we were outfitting our stores with Tempur-Pedic beds, and when we expanded to New Orleans, we quickly grew to become one of the largest distributors of Tempur-Pedic memory foam beds in the nation. Out of 6,500 dealers, we were number 35, and for two solid years our phones rang off the hook, trucks were rolling, with everyone wanting to take a ride on this “space-age” super high tech bed that molds around your body. Problem was, we had a fairly high rate of return, and people often complained about off-gassing “chemical” odors, since the beds are manufactured using petroleum derived, synthetic urethane foam. Other complaints included the mattresses becoming very hot while sleeping on them, the foam becoming rock hard during cold times of the year (memory foam is often temperature sensitive and responds by either getting extremely firm, or so soft it feels like you’re swimming in it).

Customers who returned their memory foam mattresses felt strongly connected to us because of our closely knit customer service mindset, and our desire to develop relationships with our customers, so they’d often ask, still enthusiastically, ”What else do you have?”…  Around this time, we in fact had been seeing Natural Latex popping up more and more at industry shows, and several reps and manufacturers had told us that Europeans were already buying Natural Latex as mainstream bedding and had been for years, so we started researching in earnest.

We felt the strong sense that our customers, who were becoming more and more green, some of them true treehuggers, wanted to move away from petroleum based bedding materials, and with more and more global emphasis on the shift away from making every single household item from oil, we also felt very strongly about this. But, we were skeptical that a mattress manufactured strictly from a botanical product could really be comfortable.

So astonished were we at the sheer comfort level of Natural Latex when we received our first custom designed prototype Latex bed, that we called our production facility to ask them how fast we could get it into a working model, and onto our website, which had by now shifted away from futons to our current concept, Habitat Furnishings, which focuses primarily on our Natural Latex mattress line, as we lost interest in or simply phased out our futon products. Once we knew we wanted to offer a Natural Latex mattress line, we began researching the current marketplace to see what existing retailers and manufacturers were already doing. What we found was pretty much what we expected.

First off, it was almost impossible to find an all natural latex bed that wasn’t either made of synthetic, petroleum based urethane foam, a blend of some natural latex and urethane foam (which some retailers still claimed was “all natural”), or a complex, laminated and layered mattress so confusing that you needed a technical manual for a starship just to figure out what was really in it. Also, every time something was laminated and glued together, we knew that a cumulative effect of exposure to formaldehyde based VOC glues was being created. Different densities, varying degrees of firmness and softness, also added to the myriad of confusion created when a customer tried to find a latex mattress. Our solution: find a source of 100% all Natural Latex, and we did, our natural material is 100% Sri Lankan white latex rubber (you can read more about our source by visiting Latex Green, the cooperative company where our latex cores, or layers, are sourced. We also wanted to offer only two very simplistically designed models, eliminate all the “myticism” and psychobabblish nonsense from the selection process. and make choosing a Natural Latex mattress simple, and even “fun”.

Our site today features two unique models, our 6″ Natural Latex bed which features one continuous “block” of Sri Lankan white latex rubber made using the Dunlop method, and our 8″ Natural Latex bed, which offers a wonderfully cushy  built-in pillowtop section, a 2″ slightly softer layer laminated using water based adhesive, to our slightly firmer 6″ base layer. Both models are encased in an organic cotton cover, and contain NO synthetic materials. Totally green, but astonishingly comfortable. You can see both of our models on our Habitat Furnishings Latex  page.