This post {AND GIVEAWAY!!} is sponsored by HomeRight. As always, all thoughts and opinions are 100% my own.
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You know those cleaning tasks that you just never seem to get around to? Well, that’s how things have been with our kitchen and dining room chairs.
I know some of you will think that I am crazy for having upholstered chairs for our kitchen table, but I love the look of them and the kids are {mostly!} past the ages of constantly spilling their milk or dropping their food. Since the chairs were slip covered, I assumed that I would be able to put them in the wash, but it turns out they are spot clean only. I did treat them with a stain guard but they have really been looking a little worse for wear over the past few months…
I am generally pretty good about cleaning up any major food spills that happen, but the chairs were just looking really grungy – especially on the seat and across the top of the chair {I am assuming from grubby little hands pulling and pushing the chairs into the tables!} When my Mom started asking when I was going to buy new chairs, I figured that it was time to make cleaning them a little more of a priority. 😉
CLEANING SUPPLIES
- dish soap
- hydrogen peroxide {I like to add a spray top to my bottles to make it easier to apply. Make sure you always keep it in the dark bottle though as it will break down quickly when exposed to light}
- HomeRight Steam Machine Plus {optional}
- Microfiber cloths {I prefer the Norwex cloths}
CLEANING INSTRUCTIONS
- Fill a large bowl with hot water and a couple of drops of dish soap. {NOTE: It is more important to use HOT water if you are not using a steam cleaner} Wet down the microfiber cloth and wet the entire area that you would like to clean, giving it a quick scrub. You want this to be quite consistently wet throughout the area that you are cleaning. I did the full seat, back, and sides for all of our chairs so I basically covered the entire surface. If you are doing a smaller area, ensure that you don’t have hard edges at the end of your wet spot as this could lead to water stains.
- Generously spray any heavily soiled areas or stains with the hydrogen peroxide. Leave on for at least 10 minutes. I have used this safely on a number of different fabrics, but always spot check on the fabric that you are using.
- Next it is time to steam clean! I experimented with using the scrub brush and the microfiber cloth with the squeegee attachments. If you are just going for an overall clean or have a more delicate fabric, I would go with the microfiber cloth option; however, I preferred to use the scrub brush over the more soiled areas and found that it worked better to clean the corners as well. Even with the cloth though, I was able to get a lot of extra dirt up…
- Run the steam cleaner over the fabric in a grid like fashion until all the areas of the chair are covered. Spend extra time on the heavily soiled areas and scrub as needed using either the scrub brush or the microfiber pad.
- If you do not have a steam cleaner, you will need to use a little extra man power and give the chair a good scrub with the microfiber cloth and water/dish soap mixture. If any stains remain, give it another go with the hydrogen peroxide and scrub again.
- Let dry and you will have a brand new chair! I was actually surprised at how well they came out!
To keep them looking new {and make them easier to clean in the future}, spray with a stain guard treatment that you can pick up at any home supply store. It’s worth the extra $10 or so!
If you haven’t tried cleaning with steam, I highly recommend it. I have been using my HomeRight Steam Machine Plus for almost two years now and am still coming up with new ways that I can use it! The high temperature, high pressurized steam easily loosens and dissolves dirt, grease, and grime {meaning a lot less scrubbing!!!} and kills 99.9% of all germs and bacteria without the use of any chemicals. I especially love it for cleaning our kitchen and bathrooms and the detachable hand held unit makes it so easy to get into any space of those little spaces that are hard to clean.
If you would like to give the HomeRight Steam Machine Plus a try for yourself, I just happen to be giving one away! Just follow the prompts on the Rafflecopter below to enter to win your own! This sweepstakes is open to residents of the US and Canada – full eligibility requirements are listed on the Rafflecopter.
For more steam cleaning tips and tricks, check out these posts…
How to Clean Grout 
Power Cleaning the Kitchen with Steam
I seriously need to clean my bathroom grout
Thinking if it could clean to upholstery in my car that would be fantastic!
Yes – I’ve used it in our car. We have leather seats but it worked great on the carpet stains!
Wow never tried cleaning with steam!
What a great item to have for the house!
Nasty dirty floors.
This could not have come at a better time! I have a mystery stain on an upholstered chair in my guest room. I’ve been hesitant to clean it because I am nervous about harming what is basically a new chair. I’ll be trying your method today! Thank you!
Hope it works! If it’s a really bad stain, I sometimes make a paste with baking soda, a drop of dish soap, and the hydrogen peroxide and just rub it in with my fingers first.
My carpet in my basement stair.
My dining room chairs could use a good cleaning!
Oh I have always wanted one of these steam cleaners!!! We are moving to a new house in a couple weeks and my list is SO long on all the things I would use it on… Our couches, chairs, tile, I could go on and on!!!
I need to clean our shower tiles, grout and wood floors!!
Wow! This is something I could really use. All my living room furniture needs a good cleaning!
We are moving to a new house in a couple weeks and we all know how clean previous owners keep their house 😉 But really, this would be AWESOME for all the tile in the bathrooms, the kitchen floor…..ah I’ve always wanted one of these!!!
Good luck with your move!!
I see. I might as well follow these procedures of yours. Thanks for this! We use upholstered chairs in our entertainment room and definitely need cleaning. I’ll let you see ours with the before and after appearance. 😀
I have never head of this steam cleaner before. I exclusively steam all of my clothes vs. ironing them, but never thought to use one for cleaning my house. I would definitely use it to clean all of the tile and grout on my floors and counter tops before everyone comes for the holiday. We are also building a house and will have all hardwood floors and could see how this would come in handy for maintaining them, and for cleaning everything top to bottom. Looks like an awesome product!
This can be used for steam cleaning clothes too! You do have to be very careful with using steam on hardwood though – I usually stick more to my tile and linoleum when steam cleaning the floors.
I’d love to try this!
I need to clean SOOO much, but I think first on my list are 2 wing back chairs. Cleaning is much cheaper than recovering.
WAY cheaper! 🙂
Great tips! I’ll definitely be referring to this article after all the Christmas craziness is over and I realize what a mess everything is!
lol! Hope you had a wonderful Christmas!
This is just what I need right now! I finished cleaning after my last holiday guests, and the only thing that’s waiting to be cleaned are my chairs in the dining room. These holidays the house was full of our friends’ families and the children were too many to be properly “controlled” an their first “victims” were my upholstered chairs. There are stains I could never guess how happened and I’m glad to find your post just now. Thanks for the great tips and have a great year!
Lovely chairs! And I really like how simple and non-toxic this cleaning method is. And at the same time it really makes a difference. The chairs look brand new and fresh. I will try this on my living room couch too. Thanks for the great tip.
Hi Jenn, Instead of a steamer – for us that we don’t owe one – can an iron’s stem be used?
It would be a little trickier to get into all of the areas with an iron and one of the benefits of a steamer without the iron is you don’t have to worry about burning the fabric and you can steam and scrub at the same time. That being said, I have used an iron on specific spot stains, so it might work. I’d try holding the iron slightly above the upholstery (not directly on it) and work in smaller sections at a time steaming and then immediately scrubbing. If you try it, let me know how it goes!
Your method worked like a charm on my new (used) armchair. So clean it looks new!
So glad it worked for you! It’s always nice to have something old look new again!
Thank you so much for a method that really works for cleaning upholstered chairs. I never thought i could get our chairs looking this good again!!!
Awesome! Glad that it worked for you. Worked amazing on mine too!
I’m gonna try this on my new dining chairs! Which stain guard treatment do you recommend?
I just used the Scotch Guard brand spray. I haven’t tried anything different but I was happy with that.
The steam cleaner benefits are to not use a lot of chemicals, but how many chemicals are in the Scotch Guard? There has to be something better than pretreating it with all those chemicals. Any ideas?
While I do try to minimize chemicals as much as I can, sometimes there just isn’t a great alternative. I only use the Scotch Guard once every one or two years so I don’t really worry about it. If you find anything that works, I’d love to hear about it!
Do you use the hydrogen peroxide full strength?
Yes! I use it in a spray bottle so it goes on fairly lightly. Just make sure to do a quick fabric check in an inconspicuous spot as it can have a bleaching effect. {although I’ve used it on a ton of fabrics and have never had an issue}