A Sizeable Problem

[stoutfellow]

I need to buy some new bedsheets.

According to various websites, the narrowest of the standard mattress sizes is 39", for the Twin and Twin XL.

My mattress is 36" wide. I also have two beds in the guest room, neither of which is as much as 39" wide.

I guess I'll have to go without a fitted sheet, instead going with two of the - would you call them topsheets? - sheets that go on top of the fitted sheet.

How recent is the current standardization? I bought my bed and its mattresses twenty-five or thirty years ago....

Comments

[graydon]

https://www.the-pillow.com.au/resources/bed_sizes is pretty comprehensive. Note that there has been a general drift to larger mattresses over time; something you bought 25 or 30 years ago can easily be non-standard now.

It sounds like what you've got are Single mattresses, which is now (mostly) subsumed into Twin as a sales category. (Two Twins is one King which is increasingly popular so each half of a couple can have their prefered mattress properties. And why make two sizes of mattress that are almost the same?)

Twin fitted sheets won't be tight but Twin flat sheets won't be large enough to let you make the bed with a bottom flat sheet; you'd need to go up a size to Double (or possibly Queen if you're trying to get over a thick mattress plus box-spring stack).

IKEA has single sheets (presuming the length matches!); I would expect a whole bunch of other places do, too, but you need to check length and width for fitted sheets.

[stoutfellow]

"Single" does ring a bell, yes.

Thank you for the information. I'm not sure what I'll be able to do with it, but it does look likely to be useful.

[mmegaera]

Was going to jump in here and say that the top sheet is called a flat sheet, but I see I have been beaten to it and then some. I suspect the three inches difference in width will be easier to deal with than having a flat sheet on the bottom, though. I hate flat sheets on the bottom (which you find in almost all motel rooms) because they don't stay tucked in properly.