When choosing velvet furniture, you are choosing a bold style for your space - its soft sheen, rich colour and innate elegance cannot be ignored. There are several types of velvet fabrics. The most popular ones are cotton velvet and synthetic velvet. They are all beautiful in their own way, with the most obvious difference being the price tag.

However, the presence of velvet in your interior also means that any discoloration or stains are very noticeable. You need to clean it regularly in order to preserve its luxurious look. Here you will find the most useful tips for maintaining your velvet sofa at home!

Pay attention with the use of harsh chemicals

Velvet is a type of fabric that doesn’t allow the use of harsh chemicals, which means you need to choose a proper cleaning product suitable for delicate fabrics. On the one hand, complicated maintenance makes velvet a less popular material for sofa upholstery, but on the other hand, it looks elegant and appealing.

Tip and trick on maintaining your velvet sofa
Cleaning a velvet sofa by hand

How to clean a velvet sofa – step by step

Everything you need to clean a velvet sofa is a soft brush, a spray bottle, rubbing alcohol, dish soap or mild detergent, a hair dryer and clean cotton towels. Once you have everything you need in hand, let’s get the velvet sofa cleaned!

The typical issues for upholstery are food and drink spills, which you have to deal with. What you have to do is mix up a mild cleaning agent. To do this, you will need dish soap, rubbing alcohol and water.

It is important to note that you should use only a quarter of a teaspoon of dish soap – not more than that! If you add more dish soap to the mixture, there would be soapy leftovers on the sofa, which would attract more dirt.

The optimum amount for velvet sofa cleaning is two spoons of rubbing alcohol. If you do not have rubbing alcohol, do not worry. Even without it, you can clean your sofa with the dish soap mixture.

After you have made the cleaning mixture, pour the solution into a spray bottle. You shouldn’t spray the solution directly on the sofa. The right cleaning technique is applying the mixture to the cotton towels and wiping over the velvet.

The idea is transferring the dirt from the sofa to the cotton towels. Repeat the procedure as long as you have to, or until you see there is no more dirt transferring to the cotton towels.

Finally, dry the sofa using a hair dryer and a brush. You can also use the soft brush to comb the velvet. That is going to get the pile a nice uniform direction and will help the pile stay right. Actually, that is the main problem about velvet cleaning – people just do not groom and dry the velvet.

How to remove spills and stains on velvet sofas?

It is not always necessary to follow the above tips. There are many more ways to eliminate different types of stains with the help of available tools:

Greasy stains are best removed with starch, baking soda or salt. Leave it on for a while, then vacuum up the salt or starch and the stain with a sponge soaked in soapy water.

Wash spilled coffee, tea and other sweet drinks with a wet towel and then apply soap and water. After 15 minutes, rinse the affected area with a clean sponge and dry with a soft cloth.

Blood is removed well with aspirin. A tablet of acetylsalicylic acid must be dissolved in a glass of water, and then wet the cloth to wipe the spot until the desired result.

It is good to clean spilled alcohol, including wine, with salt, because it perfectly absorbs dyes.

Vinegar can help fight stubborn stains. A suitable solution can be prepared with acetic acid, and then applied to the affected area, and after 30 minutes, rinse with clean water and dry.

How to maintain velvet

What are the properties of velvet fabric?

The velvet sofa has a number of advantages:

  • Practicality - Velvet is completely resistant to dust, owners with pets can rest on it, wool does not collect on it.
  • Safety - In production, threads and other materials are used that do not cause allergic reactions in people. Therefore, if someone suffers from allergies, there is no need to worry, since the pile is completely safe.
  • Nice to the touch - The material has special properties that make it as pleasant to the touch as possible.
  • Resistant - When sitting, no deformation occurs, the pile is in the same position as it was.

What are the downsides of velvet upholstery?

  • There are also certain specifics that prevent velvet from taking a leading position in the sale:
  • Vulnerability to certain drinks - If you can easily deal with dust, then you will have to tinker with spilled coffee, tea or even carbonated drinks, since they are very densely eaten into this material.
  • Loss of gloss - If your family has many children or a sofa is used quite often, then the gloss is lost very quickly.
  • Price - The fabric is not cheap, and therefore you have to fork out to buy furniture from this type of material.
  • Velvet furniture requires special care and attention its entire life. It must be cleaned without the use of harsh chemicals and method, and also at regular intervals.
Velvet upholstery

What are some tips for cleaning velvet sofas?

There are certain rules for caring for velvet furniture, by observing which you can prolong the service life of velvet furniture. Follow these rules, and your velvet furniture will serve for a long time:

  1. Remove spills immediately. Do not wait for them to dry; Only blot the stained area - do not rub
  2. Carry out cleaning with a vacuum cleaner regularly, using a special nozzle;
  3. Do not use cleaning agents with large granules or grains, they can remain in the pile and then it is quite difficult to remove them;
  4. For velvet couch cleaning use only products intended for this type of fabric;
  5. Do not get leave the velvet sofa wet for too long - even upholstery cleaners use minimal amounts of water during professional cleaning of velvet items.
  6. To clean velvet furniture, use paper towels or microfibre cloths in order to avoid damage;
  7. Make sure to only gently brush, as scrubbing will be damaging to the fabric;
  8. If you did end up using water to clean the sofa, make sure you allow time for it to air dry.

How do you protect velvet furniture?

Putting a blanket or a fabric protector on top of your velvet sofa would be a crime. After all, why spend invest in velvet furniture if you're going to cover it afterwards? Our suggestion is to have the sofa Stain Protected every time you have it professionally cleaned. The invisible protective layer keeps the stains on top, and allows you to deal with them efficiently whenever accidents occur.

Now you know exactly how to clean your velvet sofa at home. If you are an owner of such a sofa, then make sure it is cleaned in a timely manner.