Tip: Cleaning Hard-to-Clean Vases

When we posted these tiny bud vases yesterday, the problem of cleaning them was pointed out by a practical-minded reader. And it's so true - many an intricate vase is fine and dandy until it's time to clean it. So, what to do?

Before you pull your pipe cleaners out, check out these methods for cleaning vases with hard-to-reach interiors:

The Sand Method: Put a little bit of sand into the vase. Add warm, soapy water and swirl it around thoroughly. The sand will scrub the vase interior and the soapy water will help loosen grit and stains from the surface. Rinse thoroughly and repeat as necessary, then allow the vase to air dry.

The Cola Method: This one really threw us for a loop. Coca Cola can actually be used to scrub surfaces that you can't reach to scrub by hand. The fizzing will "scrub" the vase interior. Just fill the vase about half way with cola, swish it around, and let stand for several minutes. Rinse well (really well) and air dry. We've read that the same can be done with denture cleaning tablets or Alka-Seltzer.

We can't wait to try one of these methods on our Tall Ribbon Vase from MoMA. That thing has not looked clean since the first few times we used it almost a decade ago! We'll bring you the results as soon as we give it a go.

Do you have a hard-to-clean vase in your home? How have you handled cleaning or do you, like us, just skip over that particular vase when you're putting flowers in water?

Comments (17)

I've used those brushes that are sold to clean baby bottles. Many of them also come with an extra-tiny bottle brush that fits inside the handle of the larger one; these are handy for really small vases.

Great ideas! It's scary how coke is a cleaning agent...

When I used to wait tables the coffee pots would always get stained from being on a burner all day; even though we rinsed and washed them often. The only thing that would get rid of the stains was ice and salt:

Throw in some ice or ice chips and some coarse or table salt.
Swirl it around for a minute or two.
Rinse.

The salt and friction melts the ice and the texture from both removes the stains.

Learned that from an old diner waitress, lol =)

I use baking soda and vinegar, let it soak for a few minutes, add salt and swirl.

denture tablets. break them in half if appropriate.

Vinegar by itself will usually take care of it. But if you need more abrasion, try salt (like already mentioned) or rice instead of sand, then it can be flushed down the garbage disposal.

I wonder if club soda (seltzer) can be used instead of cola - since they are both the same except the addition of sticky, flavored syrup.

I love using denture tablets! I use them for vases, small mouthed water bottles, coffee cups, burnt on food product and I even toss one in my toilet before I go to bed. Minty fresh cleaning.

Cleaning a bong was always a disgusting and difficult task until I found out you could throw about 2 inches of table salt in with a couple of dashes of isopropyl alcohol. Shake the shit out of it and presto, sparkly clean.

Coca-Cola seems like the best cleaner from my experience. It dissolves everything without etching & fogging glass. It's just hard to waste a good soda.

Fill it with a fresh Coca-Cola and let it sit overnight. Everything rinses out in the morning.

I would be afraid the sand would scratch glass vessels.

Another trick I figured out is how to clean a large container with a small opening (like an old wine jug I was using for ice tea.) Put some warm soapy water in and stuff a wet washcloth through the opening, but hold onto a corner of it at the lip. Then you can swish the washcloth all around and it will physically clean off all the edges and bottom too.

Sand will scratch. Uncooked rice works better.

Ditto to using uncooked rice. That's how I've always cleaned vases.

The cleaning power of coke comes, at least partially, from its high content of phosphoric acid, and its high salt content. So I would predict that seltzer would not be as efficient.

Denture tablets. Favorites of altar guilds the world over.

I tried using Coke once to clean a pitcher, and I wouldn't recommend it. I left it overnight, and the next morning just had the impossible task of cleaning off the sticky
Coke, as well as the original stains.

Thanks, huggybrown! - that's always been a conundrum.