How To Clean A Shag Rug?

Shaggy rugs tend to usually be chosen for the great feeling their carpet fibers provide under your feet. While these fluffy fibers may feel great, cleaning a shag rug may seem like an intimidating task at first. Depending on the foot traffic it sees, your shag rugs may collect dust and get dirty easily. To clean your shag rug is a little trickier than regular carpets due to its fibers, follow this article to learn how to clean a shag rug.

Here are a few simple tips to clean your shag rug:

 A shag rug or shag carpet has long fibers on it thus it is not always easy to get dust particles out of it and reach the rug inside. If yours is a small rug this step will be a bit easier! As the first step of cleaning your shaggy rugs, give it a good shake. This will allow your rug fibers to release the collected dust and dirt. Beware, when you clean a shag rug, especially if it is been in an area with heavy traffic in your house, there will be lots of dust and dirt released, so it is better to do it in an open space. If you do not have any space to release the dirt and dust into, you can always vacuum afterward when vacuuming the shag rug.

At this stage, also beware of dust mites as they can cause allergies and cause discomfort for you. After shaking, as a cleaning method, you can hang your shag rug and beat It carefully with a rug beater to get even more dust out of it. This rug beater can be a vacuum handle, broomstick, and many other household items. This will cause fibers to open up and get more dirt out of the shag rug. This will require a bit of strength and that is the difficulty involved in this process. After this, your shag rug or shag carpet will be ready for the next step…

The answer is yes. Vacuum cleaners are pretty useful when you clean a shag carpet or shag rug. But you need to be careful when vacuuming. It is preferred that you also use a beater bar. Depending on the length of the fibers on your rug, you may need to vacuum a spot more than once to get the dirt out. Carefully vacuum not to damage any fibers, especially sides of shag carpet or shag rug may be more vulnerable to vacuum.

If you damage shaggy rugs too much when vacuuming, they may lose their feeling and your beautiful shag carpet may feel different than what it was once before. If you also have a beater bar in your vacuum cleaner, it may come in handy with the right vacuum setting. Carpet rakes and upholstery attachments are also great tools to use when cleaning shaggy rugs and getting the dirt out. But when using such attachments in your vacuum cleaner when vacuuming your shag rug, check for the manufacturer’s instructions in the label of the shag rug.

Depending on your vacuum cleaner, you should also be care full not to get high piles to get caught in the vacuum and break the shape of the rug, and damage long fibers of high piles when getting the dirt out. You can also vacuum from rug backing or carpet backing in reverse to get more of the dirt out. You can also hang your carpets when you vacuum them on a wall or against a solid object not to move after beating to get the dirt out of your shag rug.

After getting dirt out of your shag rug, you need to focus on more isolated incidents that may have happened involving your rug or carpet. The nature of the stain should help you determine a cleaning method.

For a short answer, steam cleaning is a good option for some rugs. You should always check the label of the product to see if it is viable for steam cleaning. If it does not have any information, you can contact your local vendor or contact the manufacturer online.

Generally, shag rugs and shag carpets that are made from natural materials such as cotton, silk, or wool rugs require washing and a steam cleaner should not be used on them. On the other hand, synthetic fibers such as acrylic or polyester can be steam cleaned.

If you spilled a liquid to your carpet or shag rug, a deep cleaning may not always be necessary. If the liquid is colored, dilute it with as much liquid as possible in the area where you will apply a spot treatment.

You can use dish soap or detergent as cleaning products for the treatment. You can use a material such as a bristle brush to rub the affected area, preferably in round motions to soften the stain. Brush it and brush it until the carpet or shaggy rug is stain-free. Rinse the carpet or shag rug to get the stains. Afterward, you can air dry shag rug or carpet.

When spot cleaning your shaggy rugs, baking soda is another method to get stains out. For persisting stains after dish soap and water, apply baking soda to the stain directly before letting it sit for a while. You can brush and get the stain out from the shaggy rug or carpet afterward.

You can also do deep cleaning if your shaggy rugs, area rugs, or carpets are beyond simple cleaning. You can use a tub or a good open space for this. Always use warm or lukewarm water not to damage the rug. Soak it in a detergent/cleaning product that is safe. Brush the stains or use a cleaning head to get them out with a deep clean process. Deep cleaning your carpets and shaggy rugs might be hard but a worthwhile thing to do! After you clean them, hang them and let them sit for a good amount of time to dry.

Dry shampoos are a good alternative if you require more than a spot cleaning but do not want things to get messy as much as deep cleaning. You need a nice dry shampoo and a brush for this. Simply shampoo the rug, brush it and let it set in for 15 minutes to soak the shampoo in. Then vacuum the shaggy rug. gy rug.

Different materials would require different treatment methods. It might be a good approach to consult to your manufacturer or local dealer for further information on proper cleaning methods.

Leather shag rugs; are aesthetically great! But they are a little hard to maintain in high traffic areas of your home. It is best to let them sit in a more secluded place of the house. Leather cleaners can be used in cleaning this type of rugs.

Wool shaggy rugs; wool is a pretty great material if you like your shaggy rug fluffy. Wool is easy on the eyes and has a good touching feeling. Most well-known disadvantage of wool shaggy rugs is that they attract particles such as dust very much 

Flokati shaggy rugs; traditionally made in Greece, flokati rugs are a type of wool rugs that are handmade. They show similar characteristics with wool, only they are fluffier! Disadvantages are also roughly the same.  

After soaking to clean a shag rug, usually, you can get your deep pile rug outside such as shorter pile rugs but if you shaggy rug is made of wool or similar materials, you can take them outside to dry out after soaking all the dampness with other towels and clothes and dry completely outside.  

Shag rugs are sensitive! Thus there is no shame in getting professional help to clean them. It is always better to get professional rug cleaners to clean your shag rugs than if you do not feel confident about cleaning them.