I have fallen asleep. Over the past two years we’ve tested dozens of different mattresses for our guide to the best mattresses you can buy online, but nothing quite like the Airwave Advanced. I first heard about this unique, plastic-filled mattress here on WIRED.com—the Internet’s go-to source for all things mattress-related—where one of our Italian freelance Wrote about the beds used by Olympic athletes in Paris. I may not, as the junior soprano would say, create a varsity athlete, let alone an Olympian, but I’m always interested in a unique, high-tech sleeping surface.
The airwave bed was made largely of cardboard, but it’s more accurate than true. Rather, the base that brought Olympic dorm mattresses to bed height was cardboard. The actual mattress filling consists of a unique ultra-fine woven polyethylene. The internals of the Airwave look exactly like an uncooked glass noodle and offer a hard enough surface to sleep on. I’m a side sleeper who appreciates some give but also wants support, and the Airweave was a little firm for me but comfortable for a week of testing in my home. If I were looking for a firm mattress that could be easily moved, this would be at the top of my list.
Photo: Martin Seizmer
Delivery of noodles
As someone who has had a lot of mattresses delivered to my door for testing, I strongly prefer the bed-in-a-box offerings that are roll-packed on a FedEx truck. Airwave is not—it comes through a shipping company. I actually refused the first delivery attempt because the mover wanted to leave a huge box, the size of a Fiat, on my lawn even though I had arranged for a white glove delivery. (I wouldn’t expect this to be a problem if you live in a large city with more professional delivery services at U-Hauls contractor locations, as is the case here in Kansas City, Missouri.)
I wouldn’t have been so worried if I’d looked inside the box, though, as the Airwave’s components are large and incompressible, rather light and thoughtfully divided into manageable sections. The company says its mattresses are “90 percent air” thanks to the fine fibers, which vaguely resemble fat fishing lines. For my king-size tester, three slabs of filler were added inside the cover, each weighing less than 40 pounds. They are large plastic rectangles covered with a soft layer of fabric and zipped into an outer shell made of polyester. After my week of testing, I was able to easily transport this mattress to its next home in my SUV, so I’d say it’s about as portable as mattresses come.
Go with the flow
Airweave was founded in 2004 by Motokuni Takaoka, a Stanford-educated Japanese engineer and serial entrepreneur. An avid cyclist, he decided to market the mattresses for use by Olympic villages and World Cup soccer teams. This technique works, because mattresses attract the attention of reporters and create fodder for press releases.
Photo: Martin Seizmer
