The duvet is the item most likely to break your home washing machine, and the one most likely to come out worse than it went in. Here is when you can wash one at home, when you genuinely should not, and what happens when we do it.
First, check two things
Size and fill. A single synthetic duvet weighs around 1.5 to 2kg dry and may survive a large domestic drum. A king feather duvet at 3kg dry can absorb several times its weight in water, overload the drum, and come out with the fill clumped into corners. If the care label says dry clean only, believe it.
Why home washing goes wrong
Three reasons. Domestic drums are too small, so the duvet cannot move and does not rinse clean. Detergent residue stays in the fill and flattens it. And home dryers rarely dry the core fully, which is how a clean-looking duvet develops a damp smell a week later. Feather and down make all three worse.
What we do differently
Our Chatham facility runs large-capacity machines built for exactly this, the same reason one of our Google reviewers sent us duvets and had them back clean, fresh, and dried in under half an hour of machine time. Every duvet is washed on its own cycle for its fill type, dried fully through the core, and returned sealed.
How often, honestly
Twice a year is the practical answer for a duvet with a cover on it, spring and autumn. Pillows once or twice a year. Mattress protectors monthly, they are the workhorse of the bed and they machine-wash easily.
The easy version
Duvets are priced per item by size and fill on our pricing page, singles through super kings, feather and synthetic. Book a pickup, leave the bulky work to the big machines, and get it back sealed and ready for the season.