While one of the most beautiful and elegant fabrics, velvet is one of the hardest to keep clean and in good shape. For this reason, most people do not wear velvet clothes or shoes on a daily basis. Even if all you do is wear your velvet shoes on special occasions, they will still need to be cleaned. If you cannot go to a dry cleaners to clean your velvet shoes, there are a few options you can try at home.
Lightly scrub the velvet with a dry, soft toothbrush. Scrub any dirt or stained area repeatedly, but not any harder than the rest of the shoe. You can tell if you are using the right amount of pressure if the bristles of the toothbrush are only slightly bending as you scrub the velvet shoe. If dry scrubbing is not enough to clean the shoe, go on to the next step.
2
Mix a small amount of mild liquid dish soap in the jar or glass with some water. Stir the soap and water with the handle of your toothbrush so suds are created.
3
Scoop some of the suds onto the bristles of your toothbrush and wipe them onto the stain on the velvet shoe. Do not get the shoe overly wet.
4
Use the same scrubbing technique as you did in Step 1 to clean the velvet shoe using the suds. Stop after a few minutes and blot the shoe clean of the suds. Dry with a clean cloth. Let the shoe sit for about 20 minutes, and look to see if the stain remains. If it does, reapply the suds and scrub the shoe again. Keep doing this until the velvet shoe is clean.
Tips & Warnings
Use lukewarm water with your mild dish soap.
Do not allow the velvet to get wet or scrub too hard with the toothbrush.
