Area Rug Cleaning in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn

On the old oak and pine floors of a Bed-Stuy row house, rugs do two jobs. They protect wood that is often more than a hundred years old, and they soften tall rooms that would otherwise echo. A big rug in the parlor, long runners in the halls, smaller pieces in the bedrooms upstairs.

Floor-level shampooing cannot reach what settles under the pile. So we bring your rugs to our plant, where water and cleaner pass through the face, the base and the backing.

Pickup and delivery cost nothing extra. The crew rolls each piece, carries it down the stair and the stoop, and comes back the same way with it clean. On return they unroll it, line it up with the room and set the furniture back on top.

Plaster walls, cast-iron radiators and old window frames all shed fine dust. In a brownstone that dust drifts down and works its way deep into a rug, where a vacuum never reaches. You notice it as a flat, gritty feel underfoot and colors that look a shade darker than they should.

At the plant, a technician checks what the rug is made of and dabs each strong color with a damp cloth to see if it moves. Jute, viscose and some cotton rugs react badly to the wrong amount of water, so the method is chosen only after that check.

Then the rug is submerged and washed, rinsed until the water runs clear, and hung or laid flat to dry slowly. Taking our time at this stage keeps the edges straight and the size the same.

Hallway runners in brownstones are often long and narrow, and they take more traffic per inch than any other rug in the house. We wash them flat so they come back straight, not wavy along the edges.

Accidents from a dog or cat are flushed out during the soak, so the smell leaves the backing and not just the surface. Fringe is washed separately and combed straight by hand.

Plan on about a week before the rug is back. If several floors have rugs, tell us when you call so one trip can take them all. Hand-knotted and antique pieces skip this process and go to our hand-wash service for oriental rugs in Bed-Stuy.

Call 1-800-589-4364 or use the quote form to schedule a rug collection in Bed-Stuy, 11216, and take 10% off as a new customer. We collect rugs on the other side of Atlantic Avenue too, in Crown Heights, and every local service is listed on the Bed-Stuy page.