Top tips to maintain black kitchen and bathroom fixtures
Installing matte black fittings is a great way to add a little modern flair to your bathroom, kitchen or laundry space. But to make sure they stay looking incredible you’ll need to know a few tricks of the trade and spend a little time cleaning and maintaining them.
To make it easier for you, we’ve put together a quick list of top tips for maintaining your black fixtures, from matte black to black metal taps.
How to take care of matte black taps?
As you probably know matte black bathroom taps, kitchen taps and laundry taps have a very different finish to chrome taps. Rather than reflecting light they absorb it, to achieve an understated modern look.
But that finish means your matte black tapware may degrade quicker, or be damaged easier than traditional chrome or brass tapware. By using a few of these tricks and avoiding certain cleaning products you can care for your matte black fittings and extend their life.
1. Avoid most cleaning products
Matte black kitchen mixers, laundry taps and bathroom taps can be damaged by abrasive, chemical cleaners like bleaches, waxes, polishes and anything acidic (including homemade vinegar cleaners).
That’s why it’s always best to avoid these when it comes to cleaning and maintaining your matte black bathroom taps and other matte black fittings. Using them can cause streaking or affect their attractive matte finish over time.
2. Use a non-abrasive cleaning product (or soapy water)
Instead of abrasive cleaning products just use good old water to clean your black kitchen mixer, bathroom taps or laundry taps (and a mild PH balanced soap if you need to do some serious cleaning).
These are gentle on your tap’s beautiful finish and will keep them looking good for years to come.
3. Try a microfibre cloth
Don’t use scourers, steel wool or other scratchy or abrasive cleaners to wash your taps. Instead go for a micro fibre cloth if you have one – if you don’t grab one from your local Bunnings or supermarket for less than $5.
These nifty little cloths pick up all the dust and grime that can settle on your matte black fixtures without scratching or damaging them.
4. Clean semi regularly
Just like all fixtures and fittings, matte black laundry taps and other matte black fittings look their best when they’re clean.
To keep them looking good all you’ll need to do is give them a quick wipe with water once a week or once a fortnight if you’re busy. If you’ve got hard water it can produce more limescale so it may pay to clean your taps more often to keep white crust from developing (which obviously doesn’t look great on black taps!).
5. Watch out for toothpaste
Bathroom products like toothpaste, makeup and nail polish can leave smudges on black tapware that can be hard to remove. Luckily this is a super easy fix – just leave a microfibre cloth under your sink and give your tap a quick wipe if you get anything on it. Simple.
6. Take care when installing
Black kitchen mixers, laundry taps and bathroom taps can last for decades if they’re installed properly. Unfortunately, most damage to black taps occurs during installation as they can be quite easy to scratch.
If you’re installing them yourself take care – if someone else is installing them just make sure you choose an experienced expert that you trust (and check the condition of your taps before and after installation).
Looking for more matching black kitchen mixers, bathroom taps or laundry taps? Browse Abey’s full range of tapware online today.