Many homeowners with area oriental rugs don’t know how to clean them properly resulting to rug damage. If you have oriental rugs in your home, here are tips on how to clean them:
Avoid twisting or wringing them
Twisting or wringing the rugs results to contraction of the fibers thus shrinking the rugs. To remove excess water from the rugs you should roll them in a towel. This eliminates the risk of shrinking the fibers thus preserving the elegant look.
Avoid hot water
A few homeowners think that dirt easily comes out when you use hot water to clean the rugs. While you might be comfortable cleaning the rugs with hot water, you will be destroying your valuable antique rugs. Hot water weakens the fibers. It also results to lose of color.
The effects are more pronounced in silk rugs. When the rugs are exposed to hot water, the water rips the rugs off their natural proteins. Due to this, the rugs start breaking.
If you have to clean the rugs use cold or warm water.
Don’t scrub the Persian rugs
Scrubbing not only reduces the lifespan of the rug, it also creates warp lines. Instead of scrubbing the rugs blot them. Use a paper towel to absorb the spills. To avoid leaving marks on the rugs use white towels instead of colored ones.
Never dry clean the rugs
Unless mentioned on the rug tag, you should never dry clean the traditional rugs. Dry cleaning the rugs makes them shrink thus giving them a bad look. You also expose the rugs to harmful chemicals. The best way of cleaning the rugs is hand washing them.
If you don’t have time to hand wash the rugs, take them to a professional cleaner.
Avoid hanging the rugs in hot sun
The recommended way of drying the rugs is air drying them. While you can place them on the sun, you shouldn’t leave them there for long. This is to protect them from fading. To protect them from excessive sun you should dry them on a windy and sunny day. If it isn’t windy, dry the rugs under cool shade.
Conclusion
These are tips that you should consider when cleaning tribal rugs. By observing the above tips you will not only have long lasting rugs, your rugs will also retain their great look for long. To increase the chances of the rugs lasting for long, buy original rugs from a reputable Persian rug store.
