Rug Cleaning
Wool and oriental rugs are beautiful and are well known for their durability. No matter how great is the rug, once you get it into your house, it becomes dirty. You of course do not wish to throw away every rug that becomes dirty. You need washable rugs so that you do not need to throw one away every month!
First, read the cleaning directions for your rug to see what kind of cleaning is suitable. For most of the rugs, wet cleaning is suitable while for some, only dry cleaning is suitable.
To clean rug, hold and shake your rug and let any bigger particles or debris all out from the rug. Some people like to beat the rug when they come to this procedure in order to let more debris falling out. You should never do that as this may break or loosen the threads and the rug may break. Oriental rug cleaning should always be more careful and you may wish to consult the manufacturer for more cleaning details.
After the shaking, there are still a lot of tiny particles and dust attached to the rug, you have to vacuum clean it. Vacuum both sides of the rug. Do it slowly especially to those oriental rugs. Repeat seven times forward and backward motion. Be careful not to vacuum the fringes as they can be easily damaged by vacuum cleaning when you pull them out.
Read this also : Tile Cleaning and Grout Cleaning
Before actually cleaning the whole rug, start the spot cleaning with stain remover. Then you can mix up mild liquid soap with a bucket of water. Shampoo over the whole rug and use a sponge to wipe clean. You may not wish to use the strong detergent or the carpet shampoo as they can damage the fabric of the rug. Also, if they are not cleaned thoroughly, you can end up with even more particles attached to the rug.
After that, rinse the rug with sufficient of water until it is completely clean. The remaining work is to dry the rug by towels rolling up. Do not try to dry the rug under sunlight as the colors change or fade.
Cleaning rugs is not that difficult! But to keep the rug long lasting as its inherent attributes, you need to maintain it well. Here are some tips:
- Clean the stain as soon as possible.
- Neutralize the pet odors by mixing 2 cups of cornmeal and a cup of borax and sprinkling onto the rug.
- Mix 1/4 cup of vinegar, 1/2 tea spoon of liquid soap and 2 cups of lukewarm water as the cleaning solution.
Source : How to Clean a Rug