Cross stitch guide
Removing stains from cross stitch
Many marks on a modern piece come out with patient hand washing. Mold has to be dried and lifted off first, and rust and ink may never come out. Anything old or precious goes to a conservator.
On this page 10 parts
Before you treat anything
- Act soon. The older a stain is, the harder it is to move.
- Dab, never rub. Rubbing roughs up the cloth and the stitches. Work on a small area and repeat.
- Keep heat away. An iron, a dryer and hot water all set a stain. Do not press the piece until the mark is gone.
- Test first. Try any remedy on a corner of the margin, or on a scrap stitched with the same threads, before it touches the design.
- No chlorine bleach. It strips color from thread, and it can damage cotton and linen for good.
The plain hand wash is the first remedy for nearly everything: how to wash cross stitch. What follows is for the marks a wash will not shift.
Mold and mildew
Mold grows where cloth sits in damp, still air. It shows as white or colored fuzzy growth or as scattered spots, usually with a musty smell.
- Dry the piece first. Spread it out in moving air. Outdoors on a dry day is ideal.
- Lift the growth off once it is dry. Take the piece outside and brush it off gently, or vacuum it with fine net over the nozzle and the nozzle held just off the cloth. Wear a mask and gloves. If you have asthma, let someone else do it.
- Then wash it by hand, if the piece is sound, colorfast cotton. Washing takes away more of the mold.
- Dry it fully, and keep it somewhere dry from now on. Mold comes back where damp does.
What is left after that may be permanent: mildew eats into fiber, and the cloth under it is weaker than the rest. Laundry guides go on to bleach at this point. Chlorine bleach is too harsh for stitched work. An oxygen bleach is the gentler kind: see yellowing, below.
Musty smells
A musty smell is a sign of mold. Airing the piece in warm, dry air makes the smell fade. Then look for the cause, which is nearly always where the piece was kept: attics, basements and damp closets are bad places for cloth.
Yellowing from age
Cotton and linen yellow with age. On a modern piece in sound, colorfast materials, a hand wash takes some of it out.
For what stays, the remedy stitchers report on needlework is an oxygen bleach: the all-fabric powder, not chlorine bleach. Dissolve it completely in hot water, let the water cool, then soak the piece and rinse it well. Test it first. Any bleach can fade some dyes and weaken fiber, so it is for a piece you could bear to lose.
Small rust-colored freckles on old linen have a name: foxing. They come with age and damp, and one explanation for them is mold, not rust. On a piece you care about, leave them alone.
On an old piece, do none of this. Museum advice is that washing a historic textile is work for a conservator, and that stains left after a gentle wash are best left alone.
Smoke
Smoke leaves an oily film with fine soot in it. Shake off loose soot first, outdoors. Then wash by hand, and expect to wash more than once. Heavy smoke staining is a job for a professional cleaner.
Pencil marks
Rub lightly with a soft eraser, taking care not to pull the weave out of line. Then wash the piece.
Pen and ink
- Lines from a wash-out marker. A soak in cool water takes them out. If a trace stays, soak again. Gridding has more on which lines come out.
- Ballpoint and permanent ink. Some never come out. The laundry method is rubbing alcohol: lay the stain face down on clean white paper towels and dab the alcohol on from the back, moving to a clean towel as the ink comes away. Test the alcohol on the thread colors first. For a piece that matters, a dry cleaner who treats stains is the safer route.
Rust
Rust comes from metal that sat against the cloth. A pin left in a piece is the usual cause.
- Never use chlorine bleach on rust. It makes the mark worse.
- Lemon juice is the mild home remedy: wet the spot with it, leave it a few minutes, then rinse every trace out. It may not work.
- Rust removers are strong acids, and the acid that works on rust can damage cotton and linen. One laundry authority says to use only a remover made for fabrics. Another says to leave rust removers to a professional.
When to stop and ask a conservator
- The piece is old, inherited or worth a lot to you.
- The cloth feels weak, or the stitches are breaking.
- The thread is silk or wool, or you do not know what it is.
- A color started to run when you tested it.
- You have tried and the mark is not changing.
Cleaning cannot be taken back once it is done, so the time to ask is before you begin.
Keeping marks away
Wash your hands before you stitch, take the pins out of a piece you are putting away, and store finished work dry. Behind glass, a piece needs a gap between it and the glass, or damp can gather there: how to frame a cross stitch shows how. When the mark is out, press the piece and finish it.