When you’re rushing to get ready for a night out – picking an outfit, complaining that you have nothing to wear, doing your makeup, and straightening your hair – it’s easy to forget that you’ve left the hot straighteners on the carpet!
If you’re facing this fiasco at the moment, you can rest assured that you’re not alone on this one. It happens to loads of people all the time!
Lucky for you, you can remove the burn marks relatively quickly, cheaply, and with little effort!
Follow the step-by-step guide below to remove the straightener burns from your carpet.
How to Remove Straightener Burns from a Carpet
Note: You can use the method below to treat hairdryer, cigarette, and curler burns, too.
Step 1: Trim or shave the charring
Steps to follow:
- Remove the hot straighteners from the surface as fast as possible. Put the tool on a heat-resistant mat and switch them off.
- Grab a small scissors or a brand-new razor.
- Carefully trim/shave the scorched bits off the carpet. Don’t over-trim/shave the fibres because you’ll be left with a patch on the carpet.
- For more precise cutting, use some tweezers to pick up the individual scorched fibres. Doing this will stop you from over-cutting the carpet.
- When you’re done, you can clean the carpet with a mild carpet cleaner.
- Allow the carpet to dry.
- The next day, you can gently brush the carpet to give it its bounce! (Snip off any loose fibres).
Step 2: Sand the burn mark
In addition to the above, you may find it helpful to sand and hoover any burnt bits off the carpet before you clean it.
Just follow the steps above, but when you reach Step 5, rub some fine grit sandpaper into the carpet and hoover it (repeat if necessary).
You can then clean the carpet using a gentle carpet cleaner and allow the floor to dry thoroughly.
Tip: To clean dark stains on light carpets, use hydrogen peroxide (3% version) and water (one part hydrogen peroxide to 10 parts water) or diluted bleach. To clean dark carpets, use a mild carpet shampoo.
Step 3: Fibre up the carpet
If you’ve been a bit heavy-handed with the scissor or razor and your carpet has lost a few fibres, replace them.
Follow the same steps as above, but before you clean your carpet, grab some carpet fibres from a hidden section of carpet and glue them into the treated patch of carpet (pick an adhesive that can be used with carpets). You’ll have to wait for the glue to dry before walking over the patch.
When the glue has dried, you can carefully brush the carpet to bring back its texture, and you can snip off any fibres that are too long/stick out!
Tip: If you want to try using an off-the-shelf stain remover to treat carpet burns, you can do so. But be prepared to see mixed/no results in the end – they don’t always work very well.
Step 4: Do a patch repair
If your straighteners have left a significant burn on your carpet and the steps above have had no effect on the blemish, it’s time you removed the section of burnt carpet and replaced it with a fresh piece of carpet.
This method is more of an ‘extreme’ or ‘last resort’ type, so only try this out if you really must.
Steps to follow:
- Vacuum your carpet to remove grime from it.
- Grab a metal ruler.
- Rub the ruler on the carpet to make a square impression around the burn mark.
- Repeat Step 3 until your square impression is obvious. This is the line you’ll cut along.
- Cut along the impressions you’ve just made with a sharp knife. Don’t press too hard because you don’t want to damage the carpet’s underlay.
- Pick up the piece of carpet you’ve cut out.
- Find a hidden patch of carpet that you can cut a replacement piece from. Under the furniture, behind cabinets, a spare patch of carpet would do!
- Make sure the replacement piece you’re going to use matches the burnt bit. Consider the patterns and colours.
- Repeat Steps 2 to 6 so you end up with a replacement square of carpet. Make the replacement piece ever so slightly bigger (a few mm on every side) so that it fits properly.
- Take the replacement patch over to the gap in the carpet and try it for overall fit (size and patterns).
- If all is well, vacuum the carpet to remove debris.
- Pop some carpet glue on the replacement square of carpet.
- Secure the replacement section into the gap.
- Press firmly on the patch of carpet.
- Put a heavy book on the replacement section overnight so it stays in place and dries.
- The following day, check the piece.
- Trim any loose fibres or bits that don’t fit with the rest of the carpet.
- Brush the carpet to ensure the texture of the new section matches the existing carpet. Do this gently.
Tip: This method can treat large-scale burn marks, like iron burns on a carpet.
Step 5: Call a pro!
If you’ve tried your best with the steps above, but you’ve ended up with a botched carpet or really can’t remove the straightener mark, call a pro for advice!
A carpet care expert can be found online (on sites like Checkatrade). All you need to do is find a specialist who lives near you and is an expert in handling straightener burns on carpets!
Just before you dash off, make sure you pick a reputable person who has glowing reviews to do the work for you. And remember to ask lots of questions so that you get a really good understanding of what’s going on!
The last thing you want is to be handed a bill for work you didn’t know needed doing.
How to Prevent Straightener Burns on a Carpet
It’s a fact that when you use a straightener, accidents happen. You’ll knock a straightener off a table or lose grip and drop it on the floor at some stage!
There’s generally no way of stopping things like this from happening. But you can prevent the hot tool from scorching your carpet too often!
Here are some ideas you can action to stop your straighteners from burning your carpet:
- Place your straighteners on a heat-resistant mat when not in use. The mat will act as a protective barrier between the hot bars on the straighteners and the smooth surface.
- Always keep an eye on your straighteners. Don’t let anyone play with them, and if you see them drop onto the floor, pick them up immediately.
- Make sure you switch your straighteners off when you’re done using them. Don’t go out and leave them on! Even if you leave your straighteners on a heat-resistant mat, you should switch them off.
- Ensure the cable attached to your straighteners isn’t tangled around your feet or other objects. If the cable is tied up around you/other objects, you may pull the straighteners off the protected surface. In turn, the tool will land on the carpet. You may not notice this, hence the carpet starts to burn.
Can You Repair All Straightener Burns on a Carpet?
You can repair most straightener burns on carpets. But how you fix your burn marks depends on how bad the blemishes are!
If the burn marks are relatively small and aren’t too deep, you should be able to remove the straightener blemishes with ease using the steps above (Steps 1 to 3).
Ultimately, the straightener marks should be gone (and, at worst, significantly reduced) by the end of the steps!
However, if your straightener burns are big and deep, they may be trickier to remove. In this case, your best option is to try and treat the burns as best as you can, but ultimately, you’re going to have to replace a section of carpet (Steps 4 and 5).
As mentioned above, you can do a patch repair yourself or get someone else to help you.
Bethan has a passion for exploring, reading, cooking and gardening! When she’s not creating culinary delights for her family, she’s concocting potions to keep her house clean!
