Along The Silk Road

A rising awareness of self-care and a better understanding of this luxurious material has led to silk being incorporated into snooze time

- Chelsea Tang

It was just a couple of years back when the idea of sleeping on silk was regarded as extremely bougie. Like something that only fitted in with say, Kim Kardashian’s silk-tufted headboard in her palatial master bedroom of her equally palatial home in Calabasas. Or perhaps an eyebrow-raising health hack practised and published on Goop by wellness guru Gwyneth Paltrow.

Truth be told, it’s hard to dissociate silk from its image as an uppity fabric found in homes belonging to people with uppity lifestyles. It has strong associations with luxury — perpetuated by how widely prized a commodity it was in history and how it was used to garb Chinese emperors. Even today, Hermès Twilly silk scarves are draped and twirled across Birkins and Kellys like badges of honour, while that one rumour where Marilyn Monroe only slept naked in silk sheets (wrapped by the scent of Chanel No.5, of course) still circulates.

The beauty benefits of silk in sleep weren’t as pronounced till recent years; in fact, silk quietly crept into beauty in the form of silk scrunchies, when people discovered they worked effectively as hair ties that didn’t yank out extra strands. They keep hair frizz- and crinkle-free too, and so admittedly, did win a decent piece of beauty spotlight before the interest eventually faded.

In 2019 came the big sleep game-changer: the silk pillowcase. This came alongside the rising importance of self-care (of which quality sleep is a huge part), and so silk was once again propelled back into the spotlight. Apart from being deemed a luxurious “investment” item to rest on — and in hindsight, very much appreciated in light of stay-home mandates — research that correlated silk with better skin and hair also surfaced.