Carpet and soft furnishing sun damage.

Without exception, almost all interior textiles (upholstery, rugs, curtains and wall coverings) will suffer fading and lightening over a period of time. The amount of damage suffered will depend on the item’s position in your house, exposure to light, colour intensity and dying type/method used.

The dying technique least susceptible to sunlight fading is solution dying, pigments are added to polymers before the fibres are formed, this seals the colour. Polyester, acrylics and nylon fibres found in carpets use this dying method.

As less dye is required when producing lighter shades, these shades fade faster than darker fibres, most dyes are made from two or more colour components, when one colour is affected more than the other, fading is viewed as colour change instead of lightening. Green hues are often made from blue and yellow dyes, if the yellow dye is affected more than the blue, the green textile looks as though it is turning blue.

In other examples, colours can fade uniformly, giving an appearance of a slightly lighter shade of the original colour. Extreme cases show a ‘bleaching’ effect, with fibres almost looking white, the fibre itself will deteriorate, becoming brittle, silk textiles are particularly prone to this type of U.V damage.

By keeping windows covered, by using blinds or curtains, damage can be reduced. More companies are now appearing offering filtration treatment for glass, these are almost invisible to the untrained eye, but delivering excellent protection for your textiles. Use search engines to locate a company local to you that will be able to provide filtering applications or solutions, search terms such as ‘window uv filter’ or glass uv screen’ should deliver results.

This is a very worthwhile exercise when you consider the cost of replacing belongings around the house, why not spend five minutes and add up the value of items that are kissed by the sun in your home!

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