When it comes to your furniture, nothing can be more devastating then watching spill after spill leave stain after stain. Leather furniture can be quite expensive, and the last thing that you’ll ever want is a stubborn stain that just can’t come out. Taking good care of your leather furniture means removing stains quickly, before they have enough time to really settle into the fibers and leave a lasting mark, and here at Long Island Maids, we want to help you learn just how to remove stains from your leather furniture.
Before we begin, remember that spills, marks, and stains are inevitable! We live with – and on – our furniture, and accidents are bound to happen! With that said, knowing the right steps to remove stains from leather furniture will be your saving grace!
Always Keep Leather Primer Handy
It’s important to remember that not all leather is created equally – in that there are different types of leather, and each piece of leather furniture you own might be made up of a different type of leather. For instance, there is semi-aniline leather, or pigmented leather – and there is also aniline leather, too.
Prime your leather furniture for cleaning with a non-ammonia or non-alkaline leather primer to ensure that the fibers are prepped for cleaning. Just a few dabs will do.
Basic Cleaning Supplies
Next, you’ll want to grab some basic cleaning supplies. Make sure that you have a nice-sized container of distilled water, along with some white microfiber cloths – the softer the better, some mild non-detergent soap, and a non-ammonia or non-alkaline leather cleaner. All you really need to remove stains from leather furniture are a few trusty and reliable products – this isn’t about reinventing the wheel, it’s just about having the right tools by your side.
Cleaning Protected & Non-Protected Leather Is A Different Process
Again, not all leather furniture is created equal! Cleaning aniline – or non-protected leather – is a different process than cleaning protected leather like pigmented or semi-aniline leather. Analine leather does not contain a protective layer over its surface, which means it looks and feels much softer – which might appeal to the interior designer in you, but it’s surely not the most durable surface, especially when it comes to stains.
Because of this, you should be able to find some information on how to clean your aniline leather sofa in your manufacturer’s manual, guide, or website. From there, follow their recommendations and be sure to use the right types of products.
On the other hand, cleaning semi-aniline and pigmented leather furniture isn’t nearly as intensive. In fact, it’s quite simple! All you have to do is dampen that white microfiber cloth that you grabbed earlier with some of the distilled water that you have handy. Dab the spot and let it air dry – this is your first course of action.
If the stain remains after it finishes drying, it’s time to take things up a notch. Now, mix a little bit of that mild non-detergent soap with some lukewarm distilled water. Dab the spot with your microfiber cloth again, but then dry it with a different cloth.
That should do the trick! That is, unless the stain that you’re battling is an oil-based stain. In this case, you’ll want to begin with dabbing the stain itself dry with your white microfiber cloth. From there, sprinkle a little bit of baking soda on the area and leave it for a couple of hours. After a few hours go by, return back to it, wipe off the baking soda, and see your stain magically disappear.
And with that, you now know just how to clean stains from leather furniture! And as always, give Long Island Maids a call, and our team can come and pay you a visit to give you a hand.
Keywords: Leather Furniture, Clean Leather, Furniture, Remove Stains From Leather Furniture, How To Remove Stains From Leather Furniture, Long Island, Long Island Maids.
Creating a feng shui home is achievable by simply moving few things around.
What is feng shui?
According to the ancient Chinese art, feng shui works on the theory that your living space should reflect your life.
All objects that are part of life possess some forms of energy called “Chi” and you can actually use this energy to attract luck, wealth and other opportunities into your home.
With the practice of feng shui, there is no need to spend your entire life sitting on the couch or on a therapy place, trying to change your life for the better.
Rather you will need to move your couch and re-arrange your interior to achieve all the benefits of feng shui.
Here are some feng shui rules, tips, and ideas you must consider:
#1: Get the front door opened
According to a feng shui consultant, energy normally flows through the front door, hence opening the front door will create pathways that will invite positive energy to flow into your room.
If you want more opportunities knocking on your door, simply place a red flowering plant or any of the red accent feng shui colors on or somewhere around your front door.
In the world of feng shui, red will always attract fortune, luck, and energy.
#2: Remove all the clutter
If you want to create a feng shui living room or living room, then you must be prepared to clear all clutters. Clutters are believed to suck all the energy within a space.
If you think you are hiding your clutter, it will be a surprise for you to know that you wouldn’t have much positive energy flowing around you with such energy-suckers.
Make sure you clear clutter everywhere in your home if you want that desirable feng shui effect.
#3: Seek some balance
To create the feng shui balance, you need feng shui plants and aside from that, you need the five feng shui elements- Earth, Fire, Wood, Metal, and water.
The main goal of having these elements in your feng shui office or home is to ensure that you stay grounded and maintain balance in your life or environment.
You can create a feng shui house for instance by placing a wooden bowl filled with stones and pebbles alongside some water and a red candle inside a flower vase.
What are feng shui colors?
The feng shui colors are connected with different elements, these are;
Black = water,
Green= Wood,
Red= Fire,
Yellow and Brown= Earth, and
White= Metal.
#4: Migrate the outdoors into your home
Transferring nature from the outdoors into your home will create some sense of peace and aside enhancing the feelings of pleasure, nature has a way of reducing feelings of anger and anxiety.
Try and flood the interior of your home with natural light by opening the windows and door, or even bring in a feng shui plant.
You may want to consider decorating your home with bamboo, wicker, stones or rocks.
Try as much as possible to adorn your walls with paintings of nature.
#5: Create feng shui mirrors
Mirrors can reflect energy, hence you should position them in a way that they can radiate more energy- these are referred to as the feng shui mirrors.
You need to ensure that the mirrors do reflect something that is beautiful and makes sure they don’t reflect stuff like the trash can that can cause reflection of low energy.
You may have to open the windows of the kitchen, bedroom or living room to allow the mirrors face beautiful flowers or plants to create that special reflection.
#6: Avoid the “runaway” chi
When you create a feng shui kitchen, for instance, you want to retain the flow of positive energy, hence you can’t benefit when energy flows through the front door and then zip away through the back door.
A runaway chi is created when there is a direct escape from the energy after it is allowed in.
Let the positive energy run in a meandering pattern so that it can share the positive energy all around the room.
Do not place furniture or any other obstruction on the path of a chi, you may consider hanging a room separator or a faceted crystal near one of your doors to reflect the energy around the room.
#7: Make your bedroom become more restful
If you want to create a feng shui bedroom, then you must make it become more restful.
Since the bedroom is one of the most important rooms in your home, and the reason being that it is the place where we all seek the restoration of our bodies and souls.
The bedroom is also the place we dream and seek peace and balance.
To create a feng shui bedroom, you must watch the items you placed in-between your mattress and your body because they can interfere with your intentions.
You can make use of some fluffy pillows to boost relaxation and make sure you don’t store stuff such as shoes, books, suitcases, and files under your bed if you want to create a Feng shui bedroom.
And if you have children and want to feng shui their bedroom, you might need some tips about organizing your children’s bedroom from our other article.
#8: Place living plants in strategic places within your home
Living plants do radiate their own chi and they have a way of drawing chi to them.
Silk plants are ideal but not plastic plants.
The best places to place your feng shui plants are the kitchen, dining room and living room, these are places where the living plants can draw abundance, promote life and connection, and create balance.
In conclusion, creating a feng shui home is one sure way of boosting your creativity and an adage says “cleanliness is next to godliness”.
For this reason, you need to make sure that your entire home environment is clean, inside and out, if you want to enjoy all the benefits of Feng Shui.
You may have to practice different forms of arrangement of feng shui elements within your home before you get it right, but don’t be afraid to make adjustments in order to achieve even better results.
