About us
Our Story
We started The Woolshire because we truly believe that we can make a difference one pillow at a time.
How it started
We got married in 2019 and built our home together in northern Idaho the following year over a long winter. As we moved away from our 9 to 5 jobs and focused on our own home and family, we grew toward a more natural way of living in the foods we eat, the clothes we wear, and the pillows we sleep on. We both find that while modernity does bring great comforts, it is also shortsighted in much of its innovation. The problems it claims to fix are often riddled with even more cancerous results that won't be known until we find the cancer to be terminal. This is why we find ourselves constantly looking to the past to find the solutions we need for the future.
Less plastic
Shortly after having our first baby in March of 2022 we decided that we wanted to greatly reduce the amount of synthetic materials in the home. It's becoming known that plastic is playing a role in infertility, reducing testosterone and sperm count, as well as causing increasing health issues. After learning that we were laying our heads on a conglomerate of plastics, glues, and poisonous chemicals for eight hours a night, we knew we had to come up with a solution. When we started to learn about the unique properties of wool, we decided it was the perfect material for a pillow. Wool is naturally flame retardant, self-cleaning, and temperature regulating. It retains its loft, is moisture-wicking, and it is very cozy. It has been used by humans for its incredible properties since the Stone Age.
Prototypes
We made many prototypes in the beginning to come up with our designs for our organic toddler pillow, our classic wool pillow, and our (not yet released) wool nursing pillow. We even made our baby his own all wool mattress! Once we came up with the perfect design we knew we needed to source our materials locally and manufacture ourselves.
The cottage economy
The cottage economy is very important to us. We believe it is crucial to work with other cottage industries to create a localized system of products to ensure quality, support family businesses, and contribute to building healthy local communities. In essence, we believe the best way to create natural pillows is to work with our neighbors.
The wool
We use American virgin wool. Most of it is scoured at Bollman in San Angelo, Texas, and then we card it ourselves. We bought a wool mill in Montana and moved it into our own new building in Sandpoint, Idaho, in 2025. Every batt is carded there on 1960s American machinery we keep running ourselves, making replacement parts when we need to, and every pillow is sewn by hand at the same place.
The cotton
As with sourcing the wool locally, we sourced high quality organic cotton grown in Texas for use in our pillow covers. Sourcing from American farms reduces supply chains, supports small family farms, and assures us that we are getting the highest quality cotton available. The cotton is USDA certified organic.
Where it comes from
What goes into a pillow
- Wool
- American virgin wool.
- Mill
- Scoured in San Angelo, Texas, then carded into batts on 1960s American machinery at our own mill in Sandpoint, Idaho.
- Cotton
- USDA certified organic cotton from Lubbock, Texas. Undyed.
- Made
- By hand in Sandpoint, Idaho, one pillow at a time.
Why we do it
As the world moves faster and faster, we built something that allows us to slow down and really focus on working with our hands to craft the best natural pillow. The world needs less plastic, less chemical factories, and more organic fabrics, sheep, and quality goods.