Washing smoke smell out of clothes and linens at home, and when to stop and send them out

Smoke gets into fabric as tiny particles and oily residue, and the smell stays until they are washed out or treated. In a closed-up closet that smell can hang on for weeks. Around Puget Sound it can come from two very different places: a summer of wildfire smoke drifting in through open windows, or soot from a fire in your own house or the one next door.

That difference decides what you can do at home. EPA says items that can be thoroughly washed, such as clothing, bedding and draperies, can generally be cleaned and kept. It also warns that ash from burned buildings generally carries more harmful chemicals than forest ash. A shirt that smells like a campfire after an August smoke event is a laundry job. A closet in a room that burned is something else.

Sort before anything gets wet

Wash at home. Everyday cotton and synthetic clothes, jeans, work clothes, sheets, towels and washable blankets that smell of smoke and have no soot or only a little.

Send out. Dry-clean-only pieces, wool, silk, leather, suede and down, formal wear, keepsakes and anything with heavy soot or an oily film. University of Illinois Extension's stain guide says severely smoke-stained items should go to a professional cleaner. Our page on contents and textile restoration explains why smoke work often needs more than an ordinary cleaner offers.

Leave for the adjuster or a crew. Anything burned or melted, anything covered in ash from a burned building, and anything soaked by firefighting water. Mattresses and pillows are not laundry. The state Department of Health says to discard porous items such as stuffed animals if they are heavily contaminated and hard to clean, but keep them until they are on your claim list.

Before you start

• Photograph and list. The insurance commissioner's office says to gather your home inventory, keep receipts, ask which items should be cleaned and which replaced, and throw nothing away until an adjuster has finished inspecting. Our smoke damage cost guide shows how contents fit into a cleanup.
• Protect yourself. Wear gloves and an N95 respirator while you handle sooty items. The Department of Health notes that an N95 does not provide adequate protection from asbestos, which is one more reason to leave debris from a burned older building to a crew.
• Check the air. Do not shake or hang anything outside during a smoke event. The state's air quality map shows current conditions.
• Keep clean and smoky apart. Carry smoky items in closed bags, and do not bring them back into a clean room or closet until they have been washed.
• Do not vacuum with a regular machine. If extinguisher powder is on the fabric, shake it off outdoors or use a HEPA vacuum first. Dry chemical powder is corrosive.

Step by step

1. Shake off light soot outdoors, downwind and away from open windows, as Illinois Extension suggests for small amounts. If shaking brings a cloud of soot, stop and move that piece to the send-out pile.
2. Make small loads. Fabric needs room to move, and a packed washer leaves residue behind. Keep smoky loads separate from everyday laundry.
3. Pretreat visible marks. Illinois Extension says to saturate them with a pretreatment stain remover, wait a minute, rub stubborn spots with heavy-duty liquid detergent and wash right away. Blot soot instead of scrubbing it.
4. Use heavy-duty detergent at the amount on the label, and add a cup of white vinegar. OSU Extension suggests that step. On a high-efficiency machine, follow the manual on where additives go.
5. Choose the water by the care tag. Illinois Extension says to match the temperature to the fabric. Start with warm instead of the hottest setting, which can set some stains, and turn it up later only if the tag allows.
6. Bleach only what can take it. On bleachable whites, use chlorine bleach per the label in place of the vinegar, never with it. Use oxygen bleach on colorfast fabrics where the tag allows.
7. Smell each piece while it is wet. Pull items out one at a time. OSU Extension says that if the smoke smell remains, wash again right away, and Illinois Extension says it may take two or three washes.
8. Air-dry. On a dry day outdoors, that is easy. In a Northwest winter, hang clothes in a clean, heated room with a fan and a slightly open window, or run a dehumidifier. Skip the damp basement or garage, where clothes dry slowly and can pick up a musty smell.
9. Smell again once dry. Smoke can seem gone when fabric is wet and come back when it dries. If you still smell it after two or three rounds, stop washing and set the piece aside for a professional.
10. Store clean clothes outside the smoke. Use sealed bins or a clean room until closets and rooms have been cleaned, or the clothes will pick the smell back up.
11. Clean the washer. Run an empty hot cycle with a washer cleaner or a cup of vinegar, and wipe the drum and door gasket. Clear the lint screen before any dryer use.

What to skip

• Scented sprays and dryer sheets, which cover the smell for a while and do not remove it.
• Home ozone machines. Ozone is hazardous to people, pets and plants, and professionals use it only in sealed, unoccupied spaces.
• The old TSP formula. Some fire department handouts still list a trisodium phosphate soak, which is caustic and only for bleachable fabric. Try detergent first, and if you do use it, follow the label and wear rubber gloves.
• Washing wet, sooty items with everything else, which spreads residue to the whole load.

Typical costs around Puget Sound

These are typical Puget Sound ranges, not quotes, and they vary by shop, fabric and the size of the loss.

• Heavy-duty detergent, vinegar, stain remover: usually $15 to $40.
• N95 respirators and gloves: usually $15 to $30.
• Laundromat, if your own machine is out of use: roughly $4 to $10 a load.
• Dry cleaning a smoky garment: often $10 to $30 an item, and ask about odor treatment first.
• Textile restoration through a contents facility: priced by the item or the pound, commonly a few hundred dollars to a few thousand for a household.

Some policies respond to smoke damage and some claims turn on the details, so ask your agent before you assume either way. If you file a covered claim and use a restoration contractor, it is $0 upfront on covered claims - insurer billed directly - deductible applies.

When to call a professional

Set the laundry aside and call when:

• Soot is heavy or oily, or fabric came from a room where a fire burned.
• The smell survives two or three washes, or returns once the clothes have been back in the closet. The source may be the room itself. See odor removal.
• Whole closets or bedding smell of smoke, which usually means the residue reached walls, carpet and ducts. Smoke and soot cleanup explains how that is handled.
• The smoke came from a wildfire and ash is at the registers or on window sills. See wildfire smoke cleanup.
• Items have high value or sentimental value, or you do not want to risk them on a home wash.
• Someone in the household has asthma or a heart or lung condition and the clothes still smell.

Dispatch covers King, Snohomish, Pierce and Kitsap counties any hour at (425) 279-7097.