Washing an Oriental Carpet

[mrboilwash]

or just another example of what could never be washed successfully in a toploader.

Visiting my mom she told me she wanted to have an old genuine oriental carpet professionally flat-washed and mentioned how expensive it was going to be.
I asked her why she wouldn`t try to wash it herself and she made clear she would not want that thing in her machine, but she wouldn`t mind if I tried on my own and might even ruin it.
So I drove it to my place and washed it.

The thing is really heavy but it did fit into that small 5 kg drum much easier than I expected.
It was full to brim of course.

On the other hand getting it out of the drum again in one piece took me at least 20 minutes. LOL

 

[mrboilwash]

Used the wool cycle at „cold“ setting which is a controlled cold at 20 °C with plenty of an enzyme free wool and silk detergent.
No fabric softener and added one more rinse with a more aggressive agitation followed by a short 900 rpm spin after the wool cycle had completed as rinsing just didn`t cut in for the huge size of the load and the overdosed detergent.

 

[mrboilwash]

I rolled it tightly before drying to even it out a bit but wasn`t sure I`d ever get it 100% flat again.

 

[mrboilwash]

Today I hauled it back to my mom`s bathroom (she`s very unconventional for her age when it comes to decorating ideas).
It was kinda dry but still a little bit damp at the same time.

The plan was to vacuum it thoroughly, there was very little lint on it from washing but still and then intended to iron it on the back side on the tiled floor to get it flat and nice again.
Well, to my surprise the vacuuming did the trick all by itself. The nozzle adhered so hard to it so it got stretched enough to flatten all the moonscape out.

Mom loved the result and said now that it`s clean again she`d put in another room once it`s completely dry and go back to a boring bathmat which is much easier to keep clean.

One side looks a bit faded by the sun but it`s by far not as bad in reality as on the picture and has nothing to do with the washing.