You already have the jet, the yacht, and the Lamborghini—but is all of this really enough? For the price of a short Gulfstream flight, you, too, could own the same item that high-ranking Vikings and European royals once dreamed of carrying to their caskets.
Eiderdown duvets, handcrafted from down culled from the rare Icelandic eider duck, have been treasured by nobility for centuries. In the past few years, they’ve emerged as a status symbol for the rest of us.
Costing up to $28,000 each, it’s no surprise that they aren’t in the lobby display at Bloomingdale’s. In fact, they’re far rarer than a Lamborghini—only around 5,000 are produced each year, versus more than 10,000 of the sports cars. While the duvets have long been sold in Germany, Japan, and parts of Europe, in the past few years, several bedding companies and start-ups have seen an uptick in interest from the United States.
James Shay, president of the men’s-wear house Isaia, describes the duvet as the apparel equivalent of a vicuña sweater, a garment that can cost tens of thousands of dollars. “You don’t need an eiderdown duvet,” he says. “You want it.”
Living in pockets of Iceland, Norway, the Faroe Islands, Greenland, and Canada, the chubby eider duck is small and round, ranging from three to six pounds. Its fluffy, spherical down has tendrils with unique clinging properties that allow the feathers to retain heat better than other types of duck and goose down. Its elasticity enables it to compress and then expand to its original form, so eiderdown duvets don’t bunch up the same way some goose-down ones can.
“It works for warmer and colder weather, since your body regulates it,” says Mark Grayson, the U.S. program manager for mattress-and-bedding manufacturer Duxiana. “It’s like wearing a wet suit.”
“You don’t need an eiderdown duvet. You want it.”
Eider ducks are a protected species, so their down can only be collected from their nests during a two-week period, either late in their eggs’ incubation phase or after they have hatched. After the down is gathered, it is dried for up to 14 hours, and cleaned twice, often by hand. About three and a half months later, it’s ready to ship. There are between 300 and 400 eiderdown sanctuaries in Iceland, but only about 20 of the larger ones are home to more than 2,000 ducks.
In wealthy European families, eiderdown quilts have been passed down for generations. Traditionally, they were folded in three sections and rested at the foot of the bed. When opened up, a pure eiderdown duvet spreads across the entire bed and can be used with or without a sheet underneath. Árni Örvarsson, a native Icelander who runs an eider-duck sanctuary, owns one that is 60 years old. His two-year-old son’s eiderdown passed through the hands of four other family members.
Duxiana and Matouk sell duvets made mostly of eiderdown that range from around $5,000 to well over $10,000. George Matouk, the company’s C.E.O., says he used to be able to count on two hands the number of eiderdown products sold each year. Since opening a Manhattan store in April, Matouk has sold the same amount in the past two months.
In early June, a new eiderdown company, UMŌ Paris, launched a $25,000 duvet, which will be sold to clients as well as customized (monograph and such) and rented to private jets for three years at a time. Founder Binith Shah says he will re-invest part of the profits into communities that maintain duck sanctuaries. “Sustainability aside, it’s extremely weight-friendly,” says interior designer Natalie Rodriguez, who specializes in private jets. “Anywhere we can save weight [on the plane] is always a plus.”
Thomas Chatfield, the former vice president of technical operations at Qatar Executive, a private-jet subsidiary owned by Qatar Airways, was given an eiderdown duvet by his German mother on his wedding day. When he helped launch the division Qatar Executive, he didn’t skimp on the bedding.
“Space is at a premium in a private jet,” says Chatfield. “You can crush eiderdown into a small bundle and pull it out and make a bed.” Now C.E.O. of Camber Aviation Management, he recommends it to all his private-jet clients. “The life of the eiderdown can be very long if you take good care of it,” he says. “It’s not just a fad.”
Duxiana began selling eiderdown duvets on the company’s Web site in 2020, and sales grew rapidly during the pandemic. “People are a bit bolder when they’re shopping at two A.M.,” says Grayson with a laugh. Still, Duxiana was hesitant to stock them in stores, and not just because of the risks of keeping a five-figure item on the showroom floor. “We have seen buyer’s remorse when someone goes home with a duvet and has to tell their spouse they spent $8,000 on it.”
Now Duxiana holds eiderdown-duvet orders for 24 hours before sending them to the supplier, just in case the customer has second thoughts. “That way,” says Grayson, “we can still be the good guy.”
Alexandra Wolfe, a former staff reporter at The Wall Street Journal, is the author of Valley of the Gods: A Silicon Valley Story