Removing chewing gum from carpets

Flavia Perugini <fperugini [at] mountvernon__org> writes

>We have a serious problem with chewing gum being dropped by visitors
>onto the modern carpets in our buildings.  Several attempts to
>remove the gum have been made but we are still looking for the best
>method and material. ...

This is advice from a conservator who is also a mother--not to be
used on artwork though!  My son had placed a chewing gum on top of
his head last year. A Dutch friend suggested to use molten chocolate
to remove it, instead of shaving all his hair. I heated a leftover
easter egg in the microwave, let it cool a bit and put that on the
entangled chewing gum. After some time it disintegrated and I could
rinse everything out. Remains to be seen if the chocolate stain can
be removed easily from the carpet.


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                  Conservation DistList Instance 18:38
                Distributed: Thursday, February 10, 2005
                       Message Id: cdl-18-38-008
                                  ***