The Kitchen Ingredient That'll Revamp Your Wallpaper

Wallpaper can add a beautiful and elegant vibe to a room, but every so often you may notice that a section of your wallpaper needs cleaning. Grease stains appear due to factors like fingerprints as well as air-borne grease particles and settled dust. Don't fret though, as there is one kitchen ingredient that will get rid of those unsightly marks. Best of all, it's something that almost everyone has in their kitchen — baking soda.

To get unsightly grease stains off your wallpaper, you'll need to make a paste of one teaspoon of water mixed with one tablespoon of baking soda. Grab a clean sponge or cloth, dip it into the mixture, and then gently dab it onto the stained wallpaper section. Set a timer for five to 10 minutes — depending on how bad the stain is — and then gently remove the mixture with a clean cloth or sponge. The stain should be completely gone without your wallpaper becoming damaged in the process.

Wallpaper requires maintenance to stay looking its best, and baking soda can also be used for this purpose, too, though it requires a more diluted mixture. To make a cleaning solution, mix two tablespoons of baking soda with five liters of water. Dip a clean cloth in the mixture and then gently wipe over the wallpaper until it's looking cleaner. It's important that you don't saturate the cloth with the baking soda/water mixture, as this could cause dampness to sink into your wallpaper.

Of course, as with any hack, there are things you should keep in mind before starting. The first one is that you shouldn't scrub too hard when cleaning. Nobody wants a wallpapered wall that has an uneven faded spot, so it's best to proceed with caution. That being said, you may need to repeat the cleaning procedure a few times if you're trying to remove particularly stubborn grime. 

Additionally, whether you plan to clean a particularly high-end wallpaper, one with an intricate pattern, or even an inexpensive one, always remember to patch test. A corner out of sight is the best place to test, even if the area has no stains. This won't take much time but will let you see if the hack is compatible with your wallpaper or not.