Rug cleaning in Brussels

A kilo of dust before the first drop of water

A living-room rug can give up as much as a kilo and a half of mineral dust, settled at the base of the pile, against the foundation, where no domestic vacuum cleaner will go and find it. It is not fluff: it is sand, angular grains that saw at the wool with every step.

Hence the first rule: nothing goes into water before it has been dusted. Mechanical dusting works by vibration and powerful suction, on both faces; beating does the same work by percussion. Wetting a dusty rug turns that sand into mud and fixes it at the bottom of the pile.

The colourfastness test decides everything else

Only then do we question the colours. A damp white cotton cloth, rubbed gently for thirty to sixty seconds on a discreet area, then left under light pressure for ten to thirty minutes — up to an hour on an old piece. We read the transfer.

That test sets everything that follows: bath temperature, immersion time, prior fixing of the dyes or not. Aniline dyes, which reached the East around 1880, account for most dye bleeds. On an ivory ground, a red that has migrated cannot be recovered.

Below 30 °C, between pH 5 and 7

Wool is washed within a narrow window, and both limits are physical. Temperature first: the fibre felts as soon as you go above 40 °C. Its scales tangle under the combined effect of heat, moisture and agitation, and that is irreversible. So we wash below 30 °C. Cold water has a second merit: the migration of the dyes is very slow in it, whereas above 40 °C it becomes markedly active.

Then the pH. Wool is washed between pH 5 and 7. Above pH 8, the alkalinity lifts the scales: the fibre swells, yellows, and can let go of its dyes. That is exactly what laundry detergents and carpet shampoos do. The soap must therefore be neutral, and we rinse until complete neutrality — not until the water looks clean.

Then there is the lanolin, the natural grease that coats every fibre and repels water-based soiling. An aggressive detergent dissolves it: the rug comes out clean, dull and defenceless.

Why hot water extraction does not suit a hand-knotted rug

The fitted-carpet cleaner sprays hot water and an alkaline detergent, then sucks part of it back up. On a carpet bonded to the floor there is no choice: it cannot be lifted, it cannot be spun, it dries in place. A hand-knotted rug, on the other hand, can be lifted: the process was invented for a covering that cannot be taken out.

And each of its three parameters is the wrong tool here. Hot water: dye bleed and felting. Alkaline detergent: scales lifted, lanolin dissolved, a residue that will call the dust back. No rinsing and no spinning: the cotton foundation and the fringes stay damp for several days, flat on the floor. Hence the brown watermarks, the cellar smell, and then the mould.

The full sequence, and eight specialities

The sequence, in order: mechanical dusting, colourfastness test, fixing if necessary, neutral soap bath below 30 °C, brushing in the direction of the pile, rinses until the water runs clear, spinning, drying flat in the shade in a ventilated atmosphere — of the order of 22 °C and 45 % relative humidity — in under twenty-four hours, on a rigid surface. A final brushing brings back the sheen.

The pages that follow set out what this protocol becomes according to the material and the problem: wool, silk, kilim, Berber, stain removal, moths, animal odours, disinfection. We collect and deliver in central Brussels, in the periphery, in Walloon Brabant, in Antwerp and in Liège. Send photographs — the whole rug, the back, each area in close-up: a costed answer within 48 working hours.