I need to adapt your mattress comparison idea a little, and would value your help in getting started. We recently moved to the UK and currently have a Dreamwool Sanctuary mattress (http://www.dreamwool.com/sanctuary-mattress/) from New Zealand (on sprung slats) which we love. It's now 10 years old, so we plan to make it the guest bed and buy ourselves a new mattress which hopefully is very similar to the present one. The list price in NZ is equal to £1750. We haven't been in the UK long enough to know how to recognise the equivalent mattress here, and that's the help I need. The mattress: It's the equivalent of a UK king size, with 1150 pocket springs (each in fabric pockets sewn to one another). We have the spring option called 'soft'', but I don't know exactly what that means in terms of spring specification. A firm steel band around the edge provides edge support. The mattress has a 5cm thick latex comfort layer on top (one-sided), and a wool topper. Some of this I know because I unzipped the sidewall of my current mattress. The people: We are 12 st and 9 st. My wife has a flexible spine and finds that she sinks into the latex layer very comfortably, but the springs still provide great support. This means she can sleep on her side with a straight spine. Progress so far: We've been into 6 different shops, with an open mind on what we would try, and not found a mattress that feels as soft on top as ours (ours has not got soft with age - on a recent trip back to NZ we went to the showroom there and lay on a new one of the same model - it felt the same as our 10-year-old one). We could in theory get another freighted from NZ but the shipping is around £500-700!

I'm sure we can find something similar here, but I don't know how to get a good list of mattresses to compare. So, my budget is up to £1750 (but I'd happily spend less). I'd like something of similar quality and comfort to the Dreamwool Sanctuary described above. Can you provide suggestions on how to start?

Thanks for putting so much information online.