Make up Your Bed Like the Professionals

You know the feeling you get when you jump into a perfectly made hotel bed? Why not bring that luxury feeling right into your bedroom at home? With just a few easy steps you can learn the technique for making your bed just like a luxury hotel and add a touch of luxuriousness to your home life. 

The style used for making beds in nice hotels is known as hospital corners. As the name suggests, this type of bed making originated in hospitals and is still used in many today. The same style has since made its way into the hospitality industry, and when paired with high-quality linens and comforters it creates the high-end experience hotels offer today. Whether you have extremely high-quality sheets, or your regular old bed sheets, learning to make your bed this way will class up your bedroom. Here are the steps to creating a hotel bed experience at home. 

1. The bottom sheet - When you put on the bottom sheet start with the corners at the head of the bed and end with the corners at the foot of the bed. Once all four corners are on tighten the sheet by pulling the material at the foot of the bed and tucking it further under. 

2. The top sheet, or sheets - here you have two options. You can use a standard single top sheet and then put your comforter on top, covering it with a duvet cover. Or, you can double-sheet your comforter, so it doesn’t require a cover. At home it tends to be simpler to use a duvet cover but if you really want that luxury experience goes for the double sheeting and just put your duvet in a protector. 

   - If you’re only using one top sheet, you’ll merely lay the top sheet across the bed with the hem about 1 foot from the head of the bed. At this time do not tuck the sheet. 

   - If you’re going to double-sheet the bed place the first sheet on the bed with the sheet inside out and the hem all the way to the top of the bed. 

3. The Comforter - Place your comforter on the bed with the top about one and a half feet from the top of the bed. a. For double sheeting, after you place the comforter on the bed, place another sheet on top of the comforter (right-side out) about 1 foot from the head of the bed. 

4. Tucking - Here is where you’ll need some practice before this style of bed making feels easy and natural. Starting by lifting one bottom corner of the bed, take the sheet, or sheets, and comforter and tuck them under the mattress in one sweeping motion. Now go to the other corner and do the same. 

5. More tucking - Now you’re going to take the un-tucked linens from the corner of the bed and tuck them along the long side of the mattress. This should leave you with linens un-tucked on either side but completely tucked at the bottom of the bed. 

6. Fold down - From the top of the bed, fold the sheeted comforter down about 6 inches.

7. Hospital corners - Looking at the linens from the foot of the bed you should now see a sharp fold over at each corner. You can sharpen the fold by tucking the linens more and creasing the top of the sheet. From here you can either leave your hospital corners open, or you can tuck the linens along both sides of the bed for a complete and formal hospital corner.

8. Place pillows back on the bed. 

When you’re done, you should be looking at a bed that appears wrapped up like a present. With a little practice, you can make your bed this way in about fifteen minutes when changing sheets and in about five minutes flat for daily maintenance. Enjoy your new and comfortable luxury bedroom experience.