Note: This post has been updated with several updates due to actually using said Lucid mattress.
Among the many things I did not expect to do during 2020, purchasing a Lucid Mattress from Amazon was right up there with moving into a new flat, and realizing my heart lived out on the Washington Coast. To be fair, we were in the middle in the C19 pandemic, there wasn’t much of a plan so much as a list of goals and if they got marked off of said list, great.
The first line item? Purchase a Zinus Green Tea Mattress. Not because I had ever slept on one, but because if Apartment Therapy raved over it, in addition to the 14,000+ reviews on Amazon, surely I would rave over it myself. I even had my Amazon Credit Card (my vice) at the ready but the mattress was out of stock. At least the queen-size mattresses were and they wouldn’t be in stock until after I moved into my new flat. The daybed (aka The Cuddle Pit) is the largest piece of furniture I own and with it being the star of the living room, I needed a mattress the day I moved in.
Being used to plans not quite working out and being someone to have 10 or so backup plans, I just pivoted. After reading through some of the reviews, I got a little squicked out by some of the negative reviews. But it’s Amazon and there are a lot of mattresses on there.
Research, Research, Research
I needed:
- quick delivery
- Comfortable
- something not terribly hot
- under 300$
- not be a fiberglass suckfest
I wasn’t planning to give up my first mattress, the Tuft & Needle. That particular mattress was slated to be used for the bedroom, which is still odd to say after two and half years of living in 400 square feet.
Bonus Life Upgrade
Did I not mention moving? I moved into a 1,000 sq ft flat in the summer of 2020. For the first time in a couple of years, I have a separate bedroom. The T&N mattress would live back there.
The Lucid mattress would live in the custom PB Teen Daybed (wasn’t kidding about the Cuddle Pit) It would be sat on, sometimes slept on, definitely lounged on, and should expect to hold at minimum one body, but upwards of three or four bodies, which required good edge support.
I know the adage, “you get what you pay for”, but sometimes, you get a great bang for your buck, and in this case, that bang would be this Mattress.
The Lucid Mattress Specs
Measurements: 60” x 80” x 10”
Firmness: Medium
Disclosures: I’m an Amazon Prime Member, so I received free shipping.
Price at time of Purchase: $231.99
Current Price: $380 (damn, Amazon.)
Review Count at Time of Post: 18,865 (4.4 out of 5 stars)
Initial Thoughts
Oh, it arrived early. A week earlier than Amazon forecasted, so it lived in the foyer for a week because the painters needed to be in the hallway.
There were a couple of bleary nights after unpacking. Move-in began around 2 am, and we got around to unpacking the mattress about… 12 hours later. This was after Chris’s husband, Adam, helped me reassemble the daybed with only three “I can’t find the damn hole” comments. Why Adam and not Chris? Well, they were seven months pregnant. Their only job that day was to “sit their ass down and look pretty.”
Once we got the mattress out of the box, I realized the first concern. “Would the corners also expand?” (Yes, after a few months of active use) This is also one of the biggest complaints from other customers. Given Adam and I sort of rolled it out of the package and flopped it on the floor while we waited and moved everything else into my flat, I didn’t expect much. You get what you pay for, right?
I’m pleasantly surprised when I say “not quite.”
The second? “Wait, it’s bumpy on the bottom.”
The third and final initial thought? “I expected it to smell funnier.”
Lucid Mattress Pros
My first pleased comment: It’s squishy. It is memory foam and the biggest complaint across the board about memory foam mattresses?
They get hot. Which when you’re sick with a kidney infection a few years later, will not matter because you’re already on fire, just sit under the A/C and wait for the fever to fade so you can function.
The heat isn’t due to the gel-infused memory foam. Heavier bodies will sink into the mattress if the weight is concentrated in one spot. When I sit criss-cross applesauce, I sink.
The mattress is great for naps that accidentally turn into full-on sleep. I’ve accidentally woken up to sunrise once or twice. Passing out in the living room was not how I planned to spend that night or other nights, but it was so comfortable! And when you’re depressed, moving to another spot, like an actual bed is not ideal.
Edge Retention
One of the mattress requirements was great edge retention, which has been pretty amazing for an inexpensive mattress. I can leave a leg or two over the edge for hours, upwards of eight hours or more, and once you get up, the mattress merely regains its shape as if you were never there.
Earlier in this post, I mentioned how there are silicone bumps on the bottom of the mattress cover, not unlike those house slippers with textured soles. Unlike my T&N, the Lucid mattress, once in place, will not shift on you during the night, which is great because the daybed has bunky boards rather than an actual frame for the mattress.
Lucid Mattress Height Issues
I purchased the ten-inch Lucid mattress as I have a 10” T&N and felt that between the daybed frame and the mattress, it was a great height for short legs. I stand by that decision, though my mattress slip could stand to have an extra inch or two of height to fill it out better. Adding a fluffy mattress cover (to protect from spills) handles the difference.
Lucid Mattress Cons
Just two cons and they’re almost insignificant in the long run, but enough that I’m obligated to mention them.
- The corners: I’m not sure what happened. I guess I didn’t let the mattress keep expanding, but the corners on this Lucid Mattress only expanded to about eight inches and not ten as advertised. This means sheets may fit a bit wonky since the corners aren’t filled out. This makes for a wibbly mattress slip, but nothing I can’t fix with mattress straps if it bothers me too much. It does look a bit weird though. (The corners need about three to six months to expand into complete fullness.)
- Heat: The Lucid Mattress gets warm. Which is great for the winter, but sucks for the summer. Adding a bamboo-based mattress pad helps knock-off some of the heat. Swapping out the velvet slipcover I originally had on the mattress also took away some of the “heat sink” effect the Cuddle Pit had during the soggy Seattle summers.
First Full Night of Sleep
Which was a complete accident. With how I stage the Cuddlepit, a line of Euro pillows stands in for the “sofa back” (technical term: scatter back). I like using down/feather pillows because they provide more depth and fullness. The Cuddlepit has seven pillows lining the backboard, and that’s before I even start with the throw pillows, whose numbers vary because it really depends on my mood that week.
I never meant to fall asleep. I just wanted a nap.
Sure, napping at 11pm is ill-advised, but I was trying to be efficient with my time and wake up an hour and a half later so I could go back to writing. Between the pillows and the mattress, and the warm embrace of a trusty blanket that lives in the cuddle pit (yes, yes, the Cuddlepit has its own blankets), that nap turned into a good two full REM cycles worth of sleep and even with how I slept, I woke up to a happy back.
Small win in my book.
Would You Buy the Lucid Mattress Again?
If I had a dedicated guest room, I would absolutely buy another Lucid mattress. I’d even consider purchasing another to replace my current Tuft & Needle (don’t come for me, T&N). I may even consider swapping my T&N and Lucid for a month to see how sleeping on it nightly fares.
Would I suggest the Lucid mattress to friends? Absolutely. Especially if they were looking for an inexpensive but good box mattress in a world of pretty expensive ones that don’t sleep well (looking at you, Casper).
So talk to me, have you played in the box mattress game yourself? If so, what mattress have you purchased, and would you suggest it to others? Talk to me in the comments because I will rave for days about my Tuft & Needle mattress…
And I guess now I’ll also rave about the Lucid mattress too.
2023 Update: Now that it’s been a couple of years and the Cuddle Pit doesn’t even have the same slipcover anymore, I can
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