Sometimes fabrics and carpets hold onto smells that are,... not so pleasant.  Sometimes the carpet gets funky.  The guest room might need a quick refresh before a guest stays over.  It seems that whenever the temperature and humidity increase, I start wandering around the house noticing all the places that need attention.  We walk around on the carpet barefoot; our pets lay on the floors and rugs (and sofas!), and if you are like my family, we spill things everywhere we go despite our best efforts. Life happens. 

Room sprays, also called linen sprays or mists, are a simple way to add a quick burst of your favorite fragrance to your spaces.  Usually, one or two spritzes into the room are enough to scent a space for a few hours. Use caution when spritzing on hard floors as they can become slippery. 

 A room spray can be a great way to quickly refreshen your living spaces in between more thorough cleanings.  Sometimes you just want some olfactory color in your life and you don’t have time to light a candle. The best part is that you don’t need to worry about an open flame, or your cat knocking over the flower vase and reed diffuser when she jumps onto the table. 

Room and Linen sprays usually have simple formulas: deionized water or witch hazel or denatured alcohol, and fragrance oil or essential oil.  Sometimes sprays include a food-grade emulsifier to help the oil mix with the water/witch hazel/denatured alcohol. Some makers also offer sprays with enzymes that neutralize odor. Water-based sprays usually have a cosmetic-grade preservative to prevent fouling.  

Before using room and linen sprays on fabrics, test an inconspicuous area to make sure it won’t stain.  The lists below offer ideas on how the sprays can be used, as well as spray amounts to start with.  Some sprays need a few minutes to “bloom”; at first it can seem like it's not strong enough but then 15 minutes later the whole house smells of freesia from the ten pumps you sprayed in the bathroom.  If you follow the suggested use below and one or two pumps aren’t strong enough after waiting a few minutes, go ahead and spray again.  You can always add more, but once its too strong, you can only open the windows 🙂

Ideas for Room Sprays

• Use room sprays in bathrooms - one to two pumps
• Freshen the air in a stale room between cleanings - start with two pumps and wait 10 minutes before spraying again
• Use when a candle isn’t practical - one to two pumps

Ideas for Linen Sprays

• Sofa cushions - one pump per cushion is enough
• Curtains - Spraying curtains around an open window will scent your space for a few hours with every billow of the curtain
• Pet bedding -  Make sure the fabric is dry before you allow your pet to use the bed
• Pillows, sheets, and bedding, especially when taking them out of the linen closet  
• Patio cushions, especially if they’ve gone unused for a time
• Seasonal clothes taken out of storage 
• Smelly shoes - one pump per shoe.  Avoid spraying leather, suede, and other special care materials.  Ensure the fabric is dry before wearing the shoes again.

Can I wear my linen spray or room spray as a body mist?

It's not a good idea to wear a spray intended as a room or linen spray as a body mist.  Rules and guidelines makers follow when creating sprays differ according to how the product will be used.  Body mists are made to be applied to the skin, and so the rules for these products are stringent to keep the product safe for its intended use. Usually body mists have less fragrance oil or essential oils than room and linen sprays, so if used inappropriately, they could cause irritation or other issues. Instead, ask your favorite maker if they can make the spray you love as body mist.

Try our Room and Linen Sprays

We offer room and linen sprays in every scent.  We keep our ingredient list simple: distilled water, fragrance oil, polysorbate (a food-grade emulsifier), and a preservative. We use premium fragrance oils, free from phthalates and cancer-causing chemicals.  Our 7-ounce vintage green bottle, made with at least 30 percent recycled content, is paired with a large trigger mist sprayer to provide about 800 pumps of the trigger per bottle.  One or two pumps per use are all you need to scent a medium-sized room, and unlike small misting sprayers, the trigger won’t transfer the spray to your fingers. 

Our Top Picks:

Lemonade - Who doesn’t love a bright citrusy clean scent like lemons? A quick spritz in the kitchen will get you ready to clean, or provide the sanity to wait another day!

Blanche - A few pumps of this rosy scent on your fabric sofa or armchair, or perhaps the curtains gently swaying in the breeze can make you feel like rose-colored glasses aren’t so bad, after all. 

Morningstar - This scent, named after the sailboat we owned for a short time when I was young, has intriguing woody and spicy notes of teakwood and allspice.  It would nicely scent your office or personal library, your cedar closet, or even your land yacht.