About

Like many housewives in England I have listened to Woman’s Hour on a daily basis but it was my daughter who listened one day and rang me to remind me of a long desired project I have had in mind – the problem surrounded by friends coming to stay the night and changing the spare beds’ sheets.

Wouldn’t it be brilliant if they brought their own linen? The Woman’s Hour interview was all around this duty all of us have over this chore. It transpires that people who live in Sweden would never dream of arriving to stay the night with friends without bringing their own linen.

So we have designed The Indoor Sleeping Bag for The Good Guest.

We started from the premise that the good hostess will always provide clean and pristine sheets for her friends – a luxury that we are always grateful for and aspire to provide. This means washing, drying, ironing, folding, putting away, hunting in the airing cupboard, time and fuss in making up and doing the whole process again for the next delightful friend.

If they brought their own Indoor Sleeping Bag it would give us hostesses the time for those lovely little things like picking fresh flowers for the spare room, dusting the bedside lamp shade and cooking a delicious supper.

The Good Guest, having brought The Indoor Sleeping Bag feels happy in the comfortable knowledge that she is sleeping in her own linen and has alleviated her hostess from checking her spare beds and her dilemma over will this do? – having swept away the odd hair and smoothing out the creases which never actually go away.

I am often invited to dinner at places over an hour away from home. My hosts are generous with their wine and quick conversation so I stay the night. I am shown up to a beautiful spare bedroom. I put on my long sleeved, floor length wincyette nightgown and do the buttons up to my neck. I get into pristine sheets at about 1.00am and leave them at 8.00am. I strip my bed. My hosts wash, dry, iron and fold the sheets probably ready for my next visit.

As a family we rent holiday cottages in Cornwall and France – we have to bring sheets with us. This means filling the car with a black sack filled with the right sized linen, a problem tricky to work out and remarkably heavy. This is before you fold your children, the dog and kite around them along with the prospect of a heap of washing to bring back on your return. Take The Indoor Sleeping Bag and save space and care. Your teen-agers could have one each and become as attached to them as their mobile phone and their requirement to watch the Simpsons every evening while you scrub the mussels for supper that you have encouraged them to pick amongst the rocks that afternoon.

I am encouraged by an endorsement from the charming head of Earthwatch, Nigel Winser who is very concerned by our cavalier approach to water. Please take your Inside Sleeping Bag to stay at Bed and Breakfasts and hotels, ask for a discount and be a Good Guest for them and the planet.