Max and Lily Twin Bed Review
I spent way too much time looking into what twin bed to purchase for my young toddler. We switched to a twin just before 18 months because he was still waking up a ton, and I wanted to be able to co-sleep in his bed when he woke up at night instead of only in ours. His toddler bed had a 50lb weight limit so I was looking to replace that with something that could handle toddler + parent. I’m pretty picky, but also on a budget.
The Max and Lily Twin Panel Bed was just about the only one I could find that met all of the qualifications I was looking for in my ideal bed:
Greenguard Gold Certified
I care a lot about chemical safety, especially in his bedroom, and this certification is stricter than others. I was willing to be somewhat flexible on this for the bed frame itself (as opposed to the mattress, which I especially cared about being GGGC), but still this certification was a big pro.
Solid Wood / High enough quality to last him quite a while
Ideally this is his childhood bed, and we never have to buy him another. I was kind of surprised to find that some of the beds advertised as “solid wood” beds often just means they include solid wood somewhere (hah!). For example, many of the pricey Pottery Barn beds that I think of as heirloom pieces actually list subtly in the description that they have solid wood legs, but the headboard and side beams are made of MDF. From what I can tell, in the Max and Lily Panel Bed the entire bed is solid wood, including the headboard. The board slats under the mattress are made of plywood, since that is apparently stronger than solid wood. I was considering finding a used Pottery Barn bed or a somewhat cheaper IKEA bed as alternatives, but once I discovered this detail I was sold on Max and Lily.
Not too tall
Low enough to work for this age (18 months) but not so low that it would be weirdly low when he’s older. The legs on this bed are 11.75” tall, plus add a couple inches for the height of the mattress, and a couple more inches for the height of the greenguard gold certified foam side rails we added under the sheets. It’s a little tricky for my son to get in and out of bed by himself at this age/height, but he can do it with some effort. At first I thought this would be a con, because I’ve heard it’s safer in a twin bed if they can do it by themselves easily. However, it’s been an advantage in some ways because he can safely do it himself but does not do it very quickly which seems to help him stay in bed more when I’m leaving and he doesn’t want to.
Classic look
I wanted something timeless so that it will continue to look good in his room as he gets older
Under $300
I wasn’t sure if this price range was possible for all of the features I wanted, but this was the one! I found it cheaper on Amazon, though some other beds from Max and Lily were cheaper directly from the retailer itself. I’ve noticed they go on sale for most holidays, about 20% off.
Besides the above Pros, here are some other notes on the bed:
Other Pros:
The hardware is gold!
It looks so pretty and higher end. I didn’t know this ahead of time but some of it shows even when it’s all put together so this was such a nice surprise detail.
It was pretty easy to put together
Each piece is labeled with a letter sticker, which was really helpful, and the pieces were used pretty much in alphabetical order. The hardware was well displayed in the instructions also. It took me a couple hours to put together, but that was with a lot of “help” from said toddler, so I think it’d have been only about an hour or so alone. I read some reviews that said they were missing pieces when it arrived. I didn’t have that problem. Everything was there and organized. It tells you in the instructions that you will also need a screw driver and a rubber mallet which are not included, but it was very easy to see when/how to use those and was no big deal at all (coming from someone who is not experienced with tools/construction).
Feels solid
It doesn’t wiggle or squeak, which is important when trying to quietly sneak off the bed and out of the room, besides the fact that it tells me it’s good quality
Really pretty finish
The color (Pecan) is darker than I expected from the pictures online but really really pretty
Shipping was faster than it said it would be.
It arrived almost a week before predicted when I ordered. I ordered it via Amazon because the price was cheaper there.
Cons:
The bottom slats are widely spaced
They’re more spread out than some other beds (9 inches apart) which meant it didn’t work with the Newton Twin mattress we originally bought, because the mattress comes in sections. So some of the gaps in the mattress were not held up by a slat and made it kind of uneven to sleep on. Max and Lily offers a premium slat roll you can buy separately which has slats only 3 inches apart which would solve this, but we actually ended up returning the mattress anyways because I found a better deal on the Brooklyn Bedding kids mattress and wanted to trade it out for that one. Here’s my post on non toxic mattress options, including the Tuft and Needle we use on our own bed.
No Tall footboard
I kind of wanted a taller footboard for this age because he moves around to both ends of the bed and I’ve been worried he would fall off the foot side before. I rolled up a towel for underneath that edge for now and that’s doing the trick.
PINE WOOD
Though it’s solid wood, the wood is pine wood, which is soft. In comparison, some higher end beds are made of rubber wood which is hard wood that wouldn’t dent or scratch as easily. We haven’t had an issue with this yet, but his dresser and crib were made of pine wood also and those do get little dings easily, so I imagine it’s coming.
