Picture this: You find your dream rug at a vintage market or your favorite home goods store. Once it arrives in your home and you lay it out, it perfectly matches all your decor and furniture. Then, after walking around on it for a few weeks, you notice some creasing in the fabric. It is an inevitable but tiring truth that the larger the rug, the more prone to wrinkles and creasing, especially with thin rugs or rugs with shorter piles.
1. Reverse Roll the Rug
An easy trick to get wrinkles out of area rugs is to roll the rug up in reverse, like taking the creases out of poster board and rolling it back up again. The reverse roll method will work well if there is light creasing in the rug’s corners and edges.
Roll up the rug in reverse and press out any creases while rolled up by applying pressure to the rug. Then, roll it back onto the floor, and hopefully, any creases will disappear. If the rug corners are not flattening, add some weights or place some furniture on top of the corners to flatten them. A rug will often settle into shape after a few days or weeks, depending on the material, so be patient and see how it behaves over time.
2. Steam the Rug
If your fabric allows it, a tried-and-true way to eliminate rug wrinkles is with a fabric steamer or iron. Use the steam setting on your iron and blow steam onto the rug, being careful not to contact the hot iron to the fabric, as doing so may cause burns. If you have a steamer, this process will work easier.
An iron’s steam can smooth out creases and return your rug to its original shape. Lay your carpet in an open area and bring your iron or steamer over the rug. Use the hot steam over the rug’s pile to eliminate the wrinkling and creasing.
If you have a thinner rug, you can iron down the rug, but check the care instructions first. Synthetic materials will melt under the iron and cause burn marks on your rug. Place a white bath towel between the iron and the rug before ironing it down.
This is a handy method for rugs wrinkled and creased from a high-traffic area like the dining room area and especially for rugs with short piles or canvas materials.
3. Tape It Down with Rug Tape or Tack Strip
If a rug crease or corner is finicky and not staying in place, rug tape or grips can help straighten the edges of the rug. Stick the tape to the bottom of your area rug, and the grips will stay on the floor, removing any creases. This is also a great idea if your rug isn’t wrinkled, but furniture and office chairs keep pulling up edges and corners.
Big rugs under the dining table can easily get creased and wrinkled from chairs constantly moving over them. See where the creases keep occurring and tape down the areas prone to friction. This way, you’ve eliminated rug wrinkles while creating a non-slip surface where the rug won’t move about.
4. Use Wrinkle Remover Spray
If you’re worried about wrinkles returning, it may be worthwhile to get a wrinkle remover spray to spray onto the surface and prevent any future wrinkling. After flattening any wrinkles and creases, spray the wrinkle remover over the entire area rug. This will stiffen the fibers in place, like hairspray, but will still maintain the rug’s soft texture.
Wrinkle spray is an excellent finisher after using one of the above methods. Tape down the rug, or reverse roll it, and finish off with some wrinkle spray. Or, after ironing and steaming the rug, vacuum it to fluff out the pile and finish with some wrinkle remover spray.
5. Use a Brush & Blow Dryer
For rugs with long piles, like shag rugs, additional care may be required to remove any wrinkles. These rugs often won’t crease and wrinkle at the base, but the pile will become creased from heavy weighted items like furniture.
Getting wrinkles out of this area rug involves fluffing out the material. First, vacuum your rug to begin fluffing out the pile. Then, use an old hairbrush or comb (that you no longer use on your hair) and brush out creases by fluffing the fibers. Fan the rug with a hair blow dryer on medium to low heat, allowing the heat to loosen up the fibers. Shape and fluff as desired with the hairbrush, removing any wrinkling and creasing along the way.
Conclusion
Nothing completes a home interior quite like an area rug. It provides that extra bit of plush comfort to a space and can also be a colorful accent to your living room. An area rug covers so much ground in an interior space that it is also prone to wrinkles and creases.
Hopefully, we have given you the methods you need on how to get wrinkles out of area rugs. These are the easiest methods that work for us, but remember, the type of rug you have and what material it is made from matters as it may need different care. Thick, plush rugs need to be handled differently than a thin rug with a short pile, for instance.
Some rugs can be machine washed while others need to have professional cleaning. Getting wrinkles out during the washing process can be a good solution for your area rug, but it depends on your needs and budget. A clean, wrinkle-free area rug in your living space can make all the difference.
