Unique Tapestry Cleaning and Repair

Today we had a customer with a unique job request; her mother made these beautiful three needlepoint tapestries back in the 50's, which are mounted to aging frames, and now the customer is trying to get them thoroughly cleaned so they can be reframed with glass fronts to display them. Couple of these needle points have cat scratches which should be restored and repaired.

At Rug Ideas we handle all types of cleaning, including tapestries. We carefully dismantled the tapestries from the frame, taking great care not to cause any damage to the half century old tapestry. The first layer was mounting screws holding the backing to the tapestry and frame; the 2nd layer was a multitude of nails holding just the tapestry to the frame.Great care needs to be taken during this process to avoid damage to the fragile needlepoint tapestry.

We will keep you updated on the progress of this project and we can't wait to see how they look after the cleaning process. We are all excited to see this project completed thoroughly and this adds another unique job to Rug Idea's belt!

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Customer Shag Rug Cleaning

We recently wrote about the cleaning of shag rugs and our superior methods of cleaning them; well recently a customer came in with their shag rug that had some "pet problems". Their dog had used this rug as a bathroom more than a few times and they were ready to take action to clean the rug.

This shag rug had been peed and pooped on and was dirty and smelly. No problem for us at Rug Ideas as we've seen this before many times. We put the shag through our deep cleaning process and had great results! (see below)

Not only did the pet stains come out but a thick layer of dirt was removed from the Shag to reveal a shiny, full pile that was hiding underneath. The rug now looks fantastic and the owner can be rest assured that it is now deep cleaned, sanitized and deodorized.

If you have a shag rug (or any rug, for that matter) that has been vandalized by your pets come in and see us so we can help in the process of getting your rug back into clean, healthy shape!

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Rug Sales and Our Return Policy

We have a detailed sales and return policy on our website. It reads:

4- There is no return on machine-made area rugs, Shag rugs, Silk rugs, natural or artificial, and tapestries. There is only a three-day exchange with similar or higher priced items. The item should be in a good condition, without wear, without dirt, dust or any damage when returned.

5- There is no return on the items which are on sale, promotion, clearance or discounted items. There is no return or exchange on rug pads.

Last year on the Black Friday and the day after that, November 25, and 26, 2011 we had a huge 50% off tent sale. A customer came into our rug store and spent almost two hours and selected four area rugs out of maybe 50 rugs. She was not sure if these were the right types and color so she took pictures of all selected rugs and texted those pictures to her husband. They called back and forth for several times and finally agreed upon what they liked to buy. We applied the 50% discount and this lady paid by credit card and took the rugs.

After 40 days she called in and said she did not like the carpets and would like to return them. Our store manager said that we had no return on the items which were on sale with several signs posted at our store mentioning: ALL SALES ARE FINAL. She said I will return them. As a courtesy, our store manager offered her to exchange the rugs and she said NO. I will return the carpets and will get my money back. She sounded very confident that she would return the carpets!

Last week, we received a note from Visa Credit Card that they had taken money out of our bank account and had credited that customer. It was frustrating. Our store manager and his assistant  called Visa and then spent a whole afternoon writing the story and what had gone between them and the client. They also took several pictures of the ALL SALES ARE FINAL signs at our store and e-mailed the file and mailed the documents and the pictures to Visa Credit Card company.

In a few days, we received a letter from the Visa mentioning that they had credited our bank account. They were convinced that the customer's claim was baseless and invalid. Our store manager and his assistant were so happy to see justice done.

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Rug Cleaning and Stain Removal

When serious stains happen to one's rug some customers take the cleaning/stain removal into their own hands, which sometimes leads to disastrous results. What might first seem like a good idea to save some money by cleaning the stains themselves often leads to in fact paying more to fix any new problems that occur when using over the counter cleaners/products. When that stain hits... call us first!

At Rug Ideas we know that every stain is different. Depending on whether wine was the culprit(or shoe polish, pet urine, pet poo, etc) the way to neutralize and fix the problem can be VERY different. Even the gender of the pet and dietary habits can make a big difference. We also take into consideration the type of material that stain has set on (wool, synthetic, silk, sheepskin) to make sure we take the appropriate professional cleaning to best get the stain neutralized and removed.

Many cleaners are often too harsh to use on rugs; what we often see is customers coming in saying they've tried to treat the stain themselves but the result is that the area being treated gets bleached or gets discolored in the process (The fix for this problem often involves spot dyeing, which is possible but can be a costlier process). We have many decades of experience working with all types of different rugs, and we can help you figure out what the the best method is to get your rug taken care of. So whether it was Fido using your rug as a bathroom, or a guest who spilled some wine at your latest get-together, we at Rug Ideas can step you through fixing the problem correctly.

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

A Busy Saturday at Our Rug Store

Yesterday was Saturday and we were at work from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm. Before and after work, we had appointments with two different customers to pick their rugs up, both in Beverly Hills which is 2 miles or 10 minutes drive from our rug gallery. One pick up was a 9' x 12' rug with pink nail polish on it. We have to do stain removal for this carpet. The other pick up was three needlepoint pieces which need cleaning and repair. They are damaged by the cats who jumped up and down and scratched these needlepoints.

At work, we were also busy with two different clients for appraisal. One of them wanted to sell a nice 7' x 10 hand knotted Persian Kashan rug and needed to know it's value. The other customer wanted to buy a 19th century French Tapestry and needed to authenticate it and know the price of it. We were also busy with selling a couple of small rugs.

My younger son Kash who is our store manager helped me at work and with the pick ups.

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Rugs and Moth Damage

prevention is better than cure. We received eight rugs for cleaning a few days ago. They were all severely moth damaged while they were in storage. Two of the eight were not cleanable we asked the owners to trash them. They put these two unsalvageable rugs in our garbage container in our parking lot. We did not take these rugs inside our rug store on to our workshop. We laid them down outside under the sun for a few hours before measuring, tagging and photographing them. At the end of the day we sent them to cleaning and sanitizing.

Cleaning is the best type of prevention when it comes to moth damages on rugs. If a rug is professionally deep cleaned, then there is a very little chance of moth damage. Of course proper wrapping with heavy duty acid free paper would help. Rugs should not be wrapped in plastics and kept in dark and and humid storage. If you store a rugs, you should open it once every few weeks and expose it to fresh air and vacuum it back and face and re-wrap it.

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

The Oldest Tapestry

The Oldest Tapestry.The Cloth of St Gereon is the oldest known European tapestry still existing, dating to the early 11th century.

The seven-color tapestry shows medallions with bulls and griffins in combat. It was probably adapted from Byzantine or Syrian silk textiles. The motifs of the tapestry could also have derived from Sassanian textiles found in Cologne. The size of the Cloth of Saint Gereon fragment at the Musée des Arts décoratifs de Lyon is 74 cm by 76 cm (2.4 × 2.5 ft). The style of design, which is strong in oriental and Byzantine character, is often also found in woven silks of the eleventh century.The weave indicates an oriental maker. 

Source: Wikipedia

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Shag Carpet Cleaning

Shag rugs are beautiful but like any other beautiful objects, they need special type of care. Shag rug is a deep pile decorative rug with long pile which gives you lots of cushioning and softness. Shag rugs were popular in the 60's and early 70's. The pile of a shag rug could be wool, cotton or synthetics. Some woolen pile types of

shag rugs are called Flokati rugs which are Greek folk and old rugs. 

                                       

We specialize in cleaning shag rugs. We clean and wash with very mild soap and ample water and dry them flat in the sun. Please leave the cleaning to professionals like us. Some people try to clean their shag carpets themselves often to find it to be lots of trouble for them. Since shag rugs have a very deep pile, once they become wet they are extremely heavy and hard to manage. Our team at Rug Ideas can handle these jobs with ease.

If you have a shag rug that needs attention get in contact with us and we can give it the care it needs. And if you are in the Los Angeles area we can arrange a pickup and delivery of your shags. Let Rug Ideas come to the rescue!

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Rug Appraisals

Rug Appraisals are another service we offer to our customers. There are many reasons to get a rug appraisal done for your rug; here are some reasons why...

1- You have inherited an Oriental, Persian or area rug and would like to know its value.
2- You want to know the value of your rug for trusts or estates.
3- You would like the value of your rug for insurance purposes.
4- You want to buy a rug and would like to know if its price is fair or not.
5- You want to sell you rug but do not know how much it is worth in today's market.
6- You want to give you rug to someone you love and want to know the value of your rug.

Whatever the reason maybe, our experts will tell you the entire general and technical details about your rugs. We take high resolution pictures from your rugs and give them to you along with a signed and sealed Rug Appraisal Certificate.

If you're too busy or live/work far away from our Los Angeles showroom, or your rugs are big and too many, we will come to your home/work to do the appraisal. You can also e-mail us the photos of your rugs and we'll get back to you. So if you have a rug you inherited, or one you bought some time back and are curious of it's value come see/talk to us; Rug Ideas has the answers!

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Special Cat Scratch Restoration Services For Rugs

Cats are pets to many rug owners. Cats love playing around the house. They pay special interest to wool rugs. While they can be just walking on your wool rug, or playing on it, at the same time they are slowly damaging it. Cat's have very sharp claws which they love to use on wool. They find it entertaining to play on wool rugs, but this pulls out the pile and can cause holes in rugs.

In many cases, after we do professional oriental deep rug cleaning for our customers, these uneven piles become clear and visible to the eye. That is why we offer our special cat scratch removal service. We have a special cat scratch sheering machine we use to even out the pile of the rug. If this is not done, the cat will keep pulling on the pile and create small holes. By having us do cat scratch restoration on your rugs, you prevent them from getting damaged. If you have rugs and have cats, you can give us a call at 310-770-9085 so we can take care of the problem for you.

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Rugs and Moth Damage

A high percentage of the damages to rugs happen by moth. If we store an unclean rug in a humid and dark place, this is most likely going to happen. Wool is protein and this is the food for moth. If they are undisturbed and the condition is right, the eggs and larvae become active and alive and infest the rugs. What is the solution? It is prevention and cleaning is the key factor.

We received eight rugs from a customer with severe moth damages. Two were trash and not solvable. The rest were somehow savable. We did not take them inside our rug gallery and workshop. We put them under the sun while some of the moths were alive jumping up and down. At the end of the day, we used our heavy duty vacuum cleaner to vacuum each rug thoroughly before we sent them all for deep hand cleaning/washing.

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085

Rug Repair: An In-House Job

A good client of ours had two runners installed on wood stairs. These runners could not be removed without getting damaged. They were nailed down to the stairs inch by inch. The fringes looked ugly on the floor and our client wanted us to do the repair in his house. The proper way of repairing these runners was to unravel the ends and then to secure them to make sure knots do not come off. But by doing this, we might lose part of the design and the client did not want to lose the design of the runners. The alternative was to use prefabricated machine made fringes and our client agreed on this.

I sent one of our repairmen with our manager to the house and they did the repair and replacement of the fringes in a few hours. The runners looked great on the floor and the stairs with new fringes.

Dr. Khosrow Sobhe (Dr. Kay)
Certified Rug Specialist (CRS)
www.LosAngelesRugCleaning.com
www.RugIdea.com
Tel. 310-770-9085