How often should handmade rugs be professionally cleaned?

Twelve to eighteen months. That's the honest default for a handmade wool rug in a normal living room, and it's the number we give when someone calls without much detail.

It moves a lot, though. A rug six feet inside the back door in a house with two dogs is living a different life than a rug under the dining table in a room that gets used at Thanksgiving. Here's how we'd set the calendar by household.

Why the numbers move

Entry rugs take the most abuse in any house. Shoes carry in sand, pollen, pavement grit and whatever came off the boat ramp, and dry grit is what wears a wool pile down: every footstep grinds it against the fibers. A doormat outside the rug helps, as long as somebody shakes the mat out.

Pets shorten the schedule even with zero accidents. Dogs and cats leave hair and body oil behind, and the favorite napping spot goes dull first. Accidents are their own category. Urine runs down into the foundation, and a spot that looks small on top can carry odor well beyond it underneath, so don't wait for the next scheduled cleaning. Our enzyme odor treatment is built for that.

Kids sit on rugs and eat on them, and half of all craft projects end up there. The rug in the playroom or family room collects crumbs and drink spills even with careful parents.

Dining room rugs look cleaner than they are. Crumbs drop into the pile and vanish, chair legs press them in, and grease from food builds up under the chairs that get used most. If the area around those chairs looks dull or the rug starts holding a food smell, it's due.

Silk is the opposite case. Handling it more than necessary is a risk in itself, so a low-traffic silk rug waits until there's a reason. Antiques get judged on their edges, fringe, foundation and old repairs. An expensive rug that barely gets walked on may not need a deep clean every year at all.

The five-minute check

You don't need a calendar if you're willing to look:

• Look at the rug in daylight. Dull walking paths and a gray cast across the pile mean soil has settled in.
• Compare an exposed section to a spot that's been under a sofa or chest (only if you can move it safely). The difference is usually bigger than people expect.
• Check the edges and fringe for darkening.
• Get down and smell it, especially in the pet's spots.
• Think back to the last cleaning. If you can't remember, that's an answer too.

Between visits, slow vacuuming is what stretches the interval. A quick pass picks up the surface; a slow one pulls grit from deeper in the pile. On a fringed rug, work the vacuum outward to the ends with the brush roll switched off.

Yes, you can clean too often

Cleaning a delicate rug just because six months went by exposes the fibers and dyes to handling they didn't need. A family room rug might genuinely need it twice a year. A decorative antique probably doesn't. The goal is to get damaging soil out before it wears the pile, without cleaning on a schedule for its own sake.

Before it goes into storage

If a rug is coming up for a move or a few years in a closet, clean it first and make sure it's completely dry. Food residue, pet contamination and soil left in a rolled rug attract insects (moths love wool) and keep working on the fibers while nobody's looking. Roll it, don't fold it. A damp rug should never be rolled at all, and in a coastal house that dryness check deserves an extra day.

Handmade rugs get cleaned right in your house; nothing gets hauled off. The technician checks the fiber and the dyes with you before setting a price. More on the Oriental rug cleaning page. If the rug has been through some home remedies already, read how improper cleaning can damage specialty rugs before you try anything else on it.

Pick the row in the table that looks like your house and put the date on the fridge.