Leesville was incorporated in 1875 and named for Col. John W. Lee, and a fair number of the houses on the Leesville side of Batesburg-Leesville have been in the same family for a long time. That shows up on the floors, and family rugs are one of our most common calls out here: a wool rug from a grandmother's dining room, a hand-knotted runner that came down from someone's attic, a braided rug nobody wants to throw out.
Those rugs are what this page is mostly about.
Cleaning an old rug without moving it
We clean rugs right where they sit. Nothing gets rolled up and driven to a plant, and the rug never leaves the room. With an older piece that matters a great deal, because a lot of the damage to old rugs happens in transit and in heavy washing, more than in daily use.
Before anything wet touches it, your technician checks a few things:
- if the dyes are stable (a damp white cloth on a hidden corner tells a lot)
- what the fiber is, since wool, cotton, and synthetics each take cleaning differently
- the fringe and edges, which are often the weakest part of an old rug
- any spots or pet stains you already know about
Then the rug gets the same low-moisture carbonated cleaning we use on carpet, worked gently and at a pace that fits the rug. A low-moisture clean means the backing and foundation don't soak through, which is the risk with hosing a rug down at home. Our area rug and oriental rug pages go into more detail, and there's a $25 rug coupon.
Here's our honest opinion on very old or very fragile pieces. If a rug has dry rot, where the foundation threads snap when you fold a corner, cleaning won't fix that and can make it worse. We'll tell you so and leave it alone. A rug like that needs a repair specialist first.
Couches, rugs, and the kitchen floor
Most Leesville visits aren't only rugs, of course. Carpet in the bedrooms, a sofa, a tile kitchen floor, hardwood in the front room: we clean all of it on the same trip. For tile we use a machine buffer that scrubs buildup out of the grout lines. For hardwood, a pH-neutral clean that's safe on finished wood.
We work the Leesville side out US-1 and US-178, and up toward the homes in Lake Murray Shores along the lake's southwest arm, all in 29070. If you're getting the house ready for family coming in for the Poultry Festival in May, give us a call ahead of time.
The Lexington line, 803-310-5135, is answered around the clock. You can also write to us from the contact page.