Real rugs (hand woven oriental and occidental rugs) are truly pieces of hand craftsmanship to showcase in your home.
They are a piece of a weaver’s life that you get to enjoy. A piece of art that will live centuries (if it is properly cared for).
Commodity rugs are mass produced today to feed a need of the fact that many people have hard floors in their homes, and they want a nice looking area rug, but they do not want to pay a fortune for it.
As with anything produced today, there can be items that are truly a great value, and others that are not worth your hard earned money. And viscose rugs are one of these areas where the great deal is just not worth it.
Viscose (also known as rayon) is in my opinion one of the absolute worst fibers to ever choose to use in something that people will walk on. Here are just a few reasons why:
Rayon/viscose is a weak fiber that distorts and breaks.
In strength tests, wool fibers can be bent up to 10,000 times before it breaks. Silk is also very strong at 2,000.
What is rayon? 70.
Yes 70. So as you can guess, walking on it becomes quite stressful for a viscose rug. Also, washing the rug (where you are required to do a little scrubbing) can be very stressful.
Rayon/viscose, because it is made from cotton by-products and wood pulp fibers, tends to show soil very quickly. It also yellows with time and can have a yellow/brown cast when it gets wet. (If you are a professional rug cleaner, you will want to give the rug a vinegar rinse, and dry face down after water removal so that you can lessen this browning and wick any that occurs to the back side of the rug.)
Another weakness of viscose rugs is the dye quality. They easily bleed.
Viscose rugs have dyes that are rarely colorfast.
In this case, a cold water flood in a home resulted in these dyes migrating all throughout this viscose rug. This is not reversible.
A flood, improper cleaning, or even a simple spill can bleed viscose rug dyes.
Why would manufacturers use a fiber so unsuitable for a rug in their inventory?
Simple. Because it is CHEAP.
They want the look of silk, but they do not want to actually use silk. They turn away a far superior fiber that will last a century, and exchange it for one that might have one solid year of looking good.
For professional rug cleaners, they are trained to identify rayon/viscose rugs and to run from them. They are one of the few rugs that end up looking worse after cleaning than better. They distort, the dyes can bleed, they fade, and they look shaggy over time.
For rug buyers, if you want the look of silk, I would suggest seeking out a lower grade silk rug over anything made of rayon or viscose. The taller the face fiber height, the lesser quality a silk rug. High quality silk rugs have a high knot count and a very low nap. Here is a very nice Qum silk rug, woven in Iran.
If you want the look of silk, then buy a real silk rug.
Viscose rugs are what we in the industry label as “disposable rugs” because they have a short life under normal foot traffic, and then they end up in the landfill and you have to go buy another one.
If all you want is a disposable rug, then go get one. They are cheap. But you can also find some great deals on wool rugs, which are fantastic for the floor and will not give you any of the headaches that viscose does. And they will last you a much, MUCH longer time.
- Lisa
we clean lots and lots of these rug and you are right…
very cold water, lay flat to dry do not touch any other rug or itself when wet and comb the nap before it drys.
We also use a cotton color fast dye-set from Masterblend prior to cleaning which does help. BUT you have to know how to clean them or you will be buying them a new one.
We refer to them as faux silk rugs…
Thanks and I like what you’re doing to the loose rug cleaning business. We clean thousands of rugs a year and there are always more out there to clean. I utilize the 1 man operators and push them to bring thier clients rugs to us so they can diversify into other areas of cleaning…
Hello Lisa, I found this post very useful. You had published it the day we received a flooded viscose/rayon/cotton rug.
You post helped her to understand that these rugs turn brown as soon as they get wet.
I find your blog very knowledgeable and it helps many people get a better understanding that area rugs are more than just a rug.
Thank you. RugloverMary
What do you think about wool/viscose blends?
If the viscose is being used as highlights of the rug – this is what will happen. The wool will look GREAT years from now – but the viscose will wear down, turn yellow, fade (if it is dyed any colors), and break off in small pieces.
I have no idea why some rug lines are using viscose right beside a strong fiber like wool – it’s kind of like making a shirt out of tissue paper, every time you move, it will break down.
If the rug is not expensive, and you like the look, then I’d say go ahead. Just know that the viscose areas will ugly out over time. And if they are just a few highlights in the rug, some accent points, then that might not be too bad to live with.
Hope that helps,
Lisa
I disagree. If you are looking for an small rug in halls or at your doorway viscose is great. They are machine washable and if you lay flat to dry you will have no problems.
I owned one for seven years and it is only now starting to wear out but because it was not expensive I feel I got my money out of it. I also have no idea why your colours would run the way you show because mine was a rusty red with navy and it never lost its colour or ran into the fringe at all.
Linda, I’m happy you found the one sturdy viscose rug out there! =) 7 years is a good run for that fiber – though wool rugs will outlive us all several times over. Chances are, your piece is a more pliable/flexible fabric piece more than actually woven rug. A rug would be too stiff to put into the standard washing machine in a home – so we are likely talking about different construction types. I have seen some tapestry weave viscose, more like a blanket than a sturdy rug. The problems I’ve noted are with those rugs. Putting a viscose rug in a washing machine would lead to color loss especially if a detergent were used on it.
If you peel open the fibers you will be able to see any color loss from the tips compared to the base of the fibers. You also will be able to grin open and see the foundation fibers, usually cotton and white, and see if the color moved during your washing of it. But if the rug is overall the same color, if it bled any you would likely not notice it anyway.
Go ahead and email me a photo if you have one, I’d like to see what you have. My email is rugchick@gmail.com
My issue with sharing the weaknesses of viscose is that many rugs today are presented as if they are SILK – when they are a knock-off that has a fraction of the strength and longevity, and they often sell it for more money than should be paid for viscose. But – if you KNOW that, and choose it anyway, that’s fine. Some people just want a good looking piece for a few years and nothing more, and if they spill on it, it’s no big deal. Which is fine too. That’s why Home Depot and Pottery Barn sell rugs, for that market of people who want some area rugs and don’t really care what the fiber is, just the look it has, and don’t care if they have to replace it in a few years. There are lots of choices for all different levels of interest and budgets.
Thanks for sharing!
Lisa
What is your experience with wool/viscose blends?
Hello Bill, thanks for the question. My experience is this, that because viscose (aka rayon) is a weak fiber, when used as a highlighting fiber in a wool rug (usually the highlights on high quality rugs are silk with wool as the main fiber) you will see over time a loss of color to the viscose, a “matting” and wearing down of those areas, and a yellowiing.
I understand their desire to use viscose, because it’s cheap, and it “looks like” silk for the short period of time in the beginning when it’s in good shape, but with foot traffic and cleaning, it simply does not hold up well. Women know this especially with our nice blouses that happen to be rayon – even with dry cleaning, it looks “old” much faster than silk ever would.
I hope someday they stop using viscose in any products. It would be one thing if they made the price of those products much lower due to the inferiority of the fiber – like particular board is at IKEA compared to real wood furniture… but they don’t. The blouses are the same price, and the rugs are as well. So you pay a good price for a bad fiber/fabric/rug.
Wool is the BEST fiber for rugs hands-down. A little bit of viscose as a highlighting design fiber is not going to ruin that rug, it’s just that those highlights will not look as good as the first year of that rug’s life.
Hope that helps,
Lisa
Hi Lisa,
Are there any synthetic fibers you would recommend? While I appreciate that wool and silk are fantastic fibers, is there anything more hypo-allergenic/allergy friendly that you would consider best in the synthetic class?
Thanks you!
S
Hi Sophia, I guess if I had to choose a synthetic fiber, I’d choose nylon. All of the synthetic fibers are petroleum by-products (plastic) so they are not the “green” choice, and I don’t know if I’d call them hypo-allergenic per se. Wool will grab more dust out of the air than synthetics will, so it’s a great air filter for a room (IF it’s regularly vacuumed of course). But you also could frequently vacuum a nylon rug.
With synthetics, I would pick a woven rug (obviously machine woven, they don’t hand weave nylon rugs) where you can see the design on the back side and NOT a tufted rug, which is a rug with material on the back. The reason I say this is because with tufted rugs a lot of latex is used to hold these rugs together, and that adhesive usually has an odor that is irritating to some people.
Hope that helps, those are just my opinions – others may think differently. =)
Lisa