How to wash sneakers

Sneak­ers must be washed reg­u­lar­ly, as path­o­gen­ic bac­te­ria often mul­ti­ply in these shoes due to sweat­ing of the feet. As a result, a fun­gus may appear in the sneak­ers, an unpleas­ant odor may occur. Reg­u­lar wash­ing of shoes will ensure a beau­ti­ful appear­ance of sneak­ers, the absence of fun­gus and microbes, a repul­sive smell.

We have pre­pared rec­om­men­da­tions for prop­er wash­ing of sneak­ers on a reg­u­lar basis and for fur­ther care of them. Fol­low them to keep your shoes look­ing their best for a long time.

Suitable mode for washing sneakers

The opti­mal modes for wash­ing sneak­ers are gen­tle. Suit­able “Hand wash”, “Del­i­cate wash”. If your machine has a “Sports shoes” mode, use it. The speed of rota­tion of the drum should be min­i­mal. As a result, the shoes will spin more slow­ly and the risk of dam­age is reduced.

In the absence of a suit­able mode, wash­ing should take a min­i­mum of time. Do not tum­ble dry: shoes should dry nat­u­ral­ly. Also, spin­ning risks break­ing the machine.

Gels and liq­uid pow­ders are suit­able for wash­ing sneak­ers. Such prod­ucts are per­fect­ly washed off regard­less of the tem­per­a­ture of the water. After using them, the sneak­ers will not leave marks and streaks, unlike stan­dard dry pow­ders.

A suit­able tem­per­a­ture for wash­ing sneak­ers is between 30 and 40°C. If the tem­per­a­ture is too high, then the syn­thet­ics and glue can be dam­aged, and if it is too low, then the dirt will not be washed off.

Sneak­ers with mem­branes are also machine wash­able, but for wash­ing, use prod­ucts designed specif­i­cal­ly for mem­branes. Com­po­si­tions with wax, oil and fat can­not be used, as they reduce the vapor per­me­abil­i­ty of the mem­branes. To restore their prop­er­ties, pur­chase indi­vid­ual impreg­na­tions: you can find them in sports and shoe stores.

It is for­bid­den to wash the fol­low­ing types of sneak­ers in the machine:

1. Shoes with dec­o­ra­tive stones, rhine­stones: if these ele­ments come off dur­ing wash­ing, they will clog the drain;
2. Illu­mi­nat­ed sneak­ers: these shoes do not tol­er­ate the effects of water;
3. Sneak­ers with foam stick­ers, with reflec­tive ele­ments: such ele­ments can eas­i­ly peel off dur­ing wash­ing.

The types of sneak­ers list­ed above are best cleaned by hand using dry clean­ing meth­ods.

Preparatory actions

If the sneak­ers still have a label, care­ful­ly study the infor­ma­tion on it. The man­u­fac­tur­er will tell you how to wash the shoes, at what tem­per­a­ture, and whether machine wash is accept­able.

Before wash­ing your sneak­ers, do the fol­low­ing:

1. Loosen shoes, remove remov­able insoles if any;
2. Rinse sneak­ers under run­ning water;
3. Make sure that there are no sand or stones inside the shoes. To do this, just punch a cou­ple over the trash can. Grass, sand and oth­er dirt can be eas­i­ly removed with a damp cloth. If there are stains on the shoes, apply a spe­cial agent to the sur­face of the sneak­ers before wash­ing;
4. Place your sneak­ers in a ded­i­cat­ed laun­dry bag. As a result, dur­ing the tor­sion of the drum, the shoes will not beat against each oth­er and against the walls of the machine. Laces and remov­able insoles can be placed in the same bag;
5. The max­i­mum num­ber of pairs per wash is up to 2. If there are too many sneak­ers in the drum, then the shoes may be dam­aged dur­ing fric­tion against the walls of the machine. Also, a too heav­i­ly clogged drum runs the risk of break­ing the equip­ment.

Do not put pairs of sneak­ers that dif­fer in col­or into the drum. Add 2–3 ter­rycloths and the same num­ber of ten­nis balls to the drum. This will bal­ance the drum, pro­vide addi­tion­al fric­tion and improve the qual­i­ty of the sneak­er wash.

Before wash­ing rag sneak­ers, you need to make sure that they are not sub­ject to shed­ding. To do this, wipe the sur­face of the shoe with a damp cloth. If it is paint­ed in the col­or of sneak­ers, then they must be washed care­ful­ly and man­u­al­ly.

If white sneak­ers are not com­plete­ly washed, use an unnec­es­sary tooth­brush. Soak it in soapy water and go over the places of con­t­a­m­i­na­tion.

Hand wash sneakers

When hand wash­ing, do not soak sneak­ers, as well as use aggres­sive deter­gents. Oth­er­wise, the shoes run the risk of stick­ing, deform­ing.

The water should be slight­ly warm. Wipe down shoes, laces and insoles. You can use a soap solu­tion, and laun­dry soap is suit­able for syn­thet­ic shoes.

Next, rinse the sneak­ers thor­ough­ly under run­ning tap water.

You should hand wash your leather sneak­ers as machine wash­ing runs the risk of warp­ing them.

Features and nuances

If the sneak­ers are made of leather or suede, then machine wash­ing is pro­hib­it­ed. Wash­ing such shoes is allowed only by hand. You can use room tem­per­a­ture water and some soap. Prod­ucts with abra­sive ele­ments in the com­po­si­tion can not be used.

Suede sneak­ers are rec­om­mend­ed to be washed only in a dry state, using a brush with a hard bris­tle. One side of the brush is designed to remove dirt, and the oth­er — to pro­vide hairi­ness.

After the sneak­ers are washed and dried, apply prod­ucts designed specif­i­cal­ly for the care of suede or leather to the sur­face of the shoes. Thanks to them, you will pre­vent dry­ing out and water­log­ging of sneak­ers.

To remove old dirt, use an alco­hol solu­tion or gaso­line. A solu­tion of bak­ing soda or dish­wash­ing deter­gent will help when deal­ing with grease stains. How­ev­er, the first time you wash your shoes, you need to test the shoes: apply the solu­tion to an incon­spic­u­ous area on the sneak­ers and check the reac­tion of the mate­r­i­al.

How to dry your sneakers

Place your washed sneak­ers in a well-ven­ti­lat­ed room. Shoes should dry at room tem­per­a­ture. To speed up this process, stuff it with crum­pled paper or place your sneak­ers in a shoe dry­er.

Do not keep shoes near heat sources such as heaters. The same applies to a hair dry­er: it is for­bid­den to use this device to speed up dry­ing. Do not place sneak­ers in direct sun­light. Due to the increased tem­per­a­ture, the shoe mate­r­i­al and the adhe­sive com­po­si­tion will be destroyed.

What to do if the sneakers began to smell

A spe­cial deodor­ant for shoes will help to quick­ly elim­i­nate the unpleas­ant smell. You can also use hydro­gen per­ox­ide to light­ly damp­en the inside of your sneak­ers.

A stan­dard wash in a machine or by hand will also elim­i­nate odors, espe­cial­ly if it is done reg­u­lar­ly.