This comforter has a warm side and a cool side—and could save your relationship

When you become a couple, one of the first things you discover is how your partner sleeps. Of course, you notice which side of the bed he or she prefers and whether or not they snore. But often, you discover that one of you sleeps hot and the other sleeps cold.

Such is the case with my husband and me. He generally radiates heat as he snoozes and I’m the one with icy feet. So, once the chilly weather hits, we never vibe with our blanket. He’s kicking off the covers and I’m shivering.

I figured that this would be the way it would always be. On cold nights, I’d have to sleep in decidedly unsexy layers of flannels and socks, waking up every winter morning cold and cranky.

Here at Reviewed, we're no strangers to comfortable bedding. We've tested to find the best pillow, best bed sheets, and best comforter on the market. But as wonderful as they are, none of them solve the problem of different sleep temperatures.

Then, I discovered a possible solution. Luxury bedding brand Crane & Canopy makes the Ultimate Luxe Down Alternative Dual Comforter, which has a different warmth and weight on each side. Brilliant! If it worked, I could spend chilly nights in comfort. My husband and I would test it by sleeping under it every night for a month.

What does the comforter look like?

I waited anxiously for delivery. When I opened the box that night, I noticed that the comforter had been carefully wrapped in tissue paper and packaged with a little bag of dried lavender—a classy presentation. After pulling off the tissue, I found that the comforter’s fabric was smooth, high thread-count cotton. Its box quilting gave it a high-end look.

The sides were labeled “lightweight” and “all year.” The lightweight side had 10-inch boxes and the warmer side had 7-inch boxes. This might bother people who are fussy about the way that looks on the bed. No worries, though. If you tuck the comforter into a duvet cover, you’ll get a uniform look. It’s easy enough to do that—at the corners of the comforter, there are sewn-in loops to attach to a duvet.

How did the comforter work?

I rolled the comforter into a duvet cover using the “sushi” method and shook it out onto the bed. It looked so fluffy and inviting that the hours until bedtime passed slowly, for me at least. Finally, we got under the covers. The night passed uneventfully.

The next morning, we compared notes. Neither of us had noticed any difference in our sleep climate. I soon realized that it had been my fault—when I made the bed, I had accidentally lined up the warm side of the comforter at the foot of the bed, over our feet. That’s a totally legitimate way to use the dual zones, it just wasn’t my intent. Simple solution: If you’re going to use a duvet cover over the dual comfort comforter, attach a small safety pin to one side at the bottom of the comforter. It’s inconspicuous and will help you tell the difference when you make the bed.

The next night, I decided to let my husband try the warm side of the comforter. That sounds irrational, I know. As I said, he normally sleeps hot. But on the rare occasions that he gets cold, he wraps the blanket around him like a burrito as he sleeps, leaving me grappling to unroll him, so I can get some blanket back. So, for that night, he got to try the warmer side of the comforter.

After a night of sleep, we compared notes again. I had been a little cold. He hadn’t become a human burrito and admitted it was a little too warm on his side of the bed. I knew that for the rest of the trial, I’d be taking the toasty side.

What we didn’t like about the dual comforter

Our dual comforter test wasn’t all sleeping perfection. Sometimes we both gravitated toward the middle of the bed, so it was hard to tell the difference between the warmer side and the cooler side of the comforter. On a couple of really cold nights, I needed to top off my side of the bed with an additional blanket for extra warmth.

And that brings up another idea—the dual comforter, which starts at around $200, might be a little too pricey for some budgets. So, to get similar results for less of an investment, we could have used a pair of less-expensive twin comforters in different weights. But we enjoy sleeping under the same layer, so for us, the dual comfort comforter turns out to be a better solution.

Should you get a dual comforter?

After a month of testing, we agreed that the trial was mostly successful. The climate on my side, the all year half, kept me cozy. My husband didn’t complain about being too warm or too cold under the lightweight side, so the comforter seemed to do what Crane & Canopy claims.

If you share a bed with a partner and you sleep at different temperatures, you might want to try it. Chances are, with more control over the climate under the covers, during the long winter nights, you’ll both sleep better.

Get the Crane & Canopy Ultimate Luxe Down Alternative Dual Comforter starting at $209

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Prices are accurate at the time this article was published, but may change over time.