Polypropylene is a synthetic material meaning it’s man-made. It has very popular due to the combination of its softness, stain resistance and its value for money.

While it has been designed for the modern home, polypropylene is suitable for parents and pet owners. It is also bleach-cleanable, making it easier to remove spillages and stains than any other carpet.

A V & A Top tip – Mix 10% bleach a water solution into a spray bottle to keep handy for that traumatic event when you stain your carpet. You can then easily spray it onto the stain and simply wipe it away. Baby wipes or wet wipes work also work very well.

You can clean your polypropylene carpet by standard methods:

• Vacuuming— Regular vacuuming is essential as not only does it get rid of loose debris in your carpet, it also brushes back up the pile that naturally starts to flatten due to natural traffic. This then keeps the carpet clean and looking its best for longer.
• Bleach solution—Polypropylene carpets are known for the ability to remove stains from it. Due to being made in the colour instead of being dyed in the colour such as a wool carpet, it can be cleaned with a 10% bleach solution. This makes removing stains quick and easy.
• Steam—for a deep clean you can steam clean your carpets. ( Not recommended ). This is not recommended to do often though as it severely reduces the life of your carpet. The steam clean process will clean the carpet but it will also harm the carpet, by affecting and the latex that holds the carpet and its backing together. The process dissolves the glue and you end up getting a ripple effect in your carpet which is called delamination. While delamination is a natural occurrence through time and use (foot traffic), the process used to clean your carpets by steam cleaning them dramatically accelerates this process. Manufacturers will also not take kindly to this if something does go wrong with your carpet.

How to clean carpet with bleach?

If you own a 100% polypropylene carpet, you can bleach-clean difficult stains such as wine, ink and mud. Because of the way the carpet is dyed, it won’t fade.

1. Use a 10% solution of thin domestic bleach and tap water for the remaining 90% of the bottle.
2. The easiest way to keep and us this is to keep it in a spray bottle.
3. Evenly cover the stain
4. If it doesn’t clean it straight away for stronger stains, repeat and leave for 30–60 minutes.
5. Rinse thoroughly with water
6. Vacuum to help the fibre to brush up again and remove any stubborn dirt as well while you are there.

Can you steam polypropylene carpets?

Yes you can, but, While you can steam clean your carpets, it isn’t something we recommend. When steam cleaning, the heat and water that go through your carpet weaken the latex keeping your carpet together. Once this has deteriorated it cause delamination. Delamination normally means the end of life for your carpet, which dependant on the carpet you buy, should be many years away and is normally traffic dependant. This process dramatically speeds up the deterioration of your carpet in the parts that you cannot see. So while the visible part of your carpet looks shiny and new again, the parts that you cant see take a heavy hit. We don’t completely deter you from doing so, as Cleaning your carpets can make a world of different visually if you cannot afford to replace your carpets, but this should only be done once or twice in the carpets lifetime.

Soft, man-made, carpets tend to be soft underfoot and extremely easy to clean and maintain. While these are the strengths of the carpet the slight drawbacks are that these are synthetics carpets and the soft nature means they don’t keep their shape as long as a wool carpet would, for example.

Wool carpets, being a natural products, bounce back into their original position quicker and for longer which allows them to look newer for longer but aren’t as easy to clean.

Man-made carpets thus are less expensive than wool carpets but don’t tend to last the 20-25 years that we’ve found wool carpets tend to do when well looked after.

In short, the thicker and softer the carpet, the quicker you will see a slight flattening in your higher traffic areas. If you are worried about it flattening we suggest going for a short and dense pile, which won’t flatten as qickly and will look better for longer.