Note: Inquiring readers, due to a busy schedule, I have updated this blog post from 2012 that discussed carpet cleaning. During this time of year, fresh air enters my open windows, while my furniture, windows, and carpets receive a thorough cleaning until everything looks and smells fresh. I’ve made a few changes to the original post by switching a link to a history of carpet cleaning to a safer site, as well as making minor edits.
This historical tidbit comes from a page designed by Knight and Doyle about the history of carpet cleaning. Some of the methods described were downright poisonous, such as using chloroform!
The screen capture below depicts a scene in Sense and Sensibility in which Elinor Dashwood, using a carpet beater made of cane, beats a carpet hung outside.
Some carpets were fitted and hard to remove. In such instances, druggets, or hard-wearing canvas cloths, came to the rescue.
One of the most common strategies of keeping carpets clean in the early nineteenth century was to use druggets, heavy woolen goods spread under tables to protect carpet from spills. They are sometimes called crumb cloths. In addition to dining rooms they were used in other areas of heavy wear. E.V. Rippingille painted The Young Trio in 1829 showing a drugget protecting carpet in a parlor where children are at play. – Historic Carpet Cleaning Methods in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Century, Edited by John Burrows, J.R. Burrows and Company (this link is not an https.)
You can clearly see the drugget underneath the table in this classic print.
Read more at these links:
- Carpet Cleaning in the 19th Century
- Keeping a Regency Home Clean, Jane Austen Variations
- Spring Cleaning at Chawton, JASNA SW
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if you have an open fire, beating is still the best choice as a hoover won’t get all the dust out. I was taught to lean out of a window with a hearth-rug and beat it on the brick one side of the window then the other. It was quite a workout! we used to tie silk scarves over our faces to beat a carpet, hung on the washing line. My great-aunt used a proper carpet beater and I wielded an old tennis racket with more enthusiasm than accuracy.
A carpet store with antique carpets said a regular straw broom works well.
worth knowing
I’ve been known to shake out a small throw rug from my portico, or even a table runner. I can vacuum the rest.
denise
Ah, modern conveniences!
When I clean my car out Vic I take the carpets out and wack them against our front garden wall. I also give them a ,”Hoover.” It works!!!!!
Same here, Tony. There’s nothing like a strong brush and a whacking to clean your smaller carpets. Twice a year I ask a professional cleaner to tend to my furniture and rugs — the modern way!
Love this. Thank you for the update!