Inside: Tips for how to remove paint from clothing, including denim and jeans; plus other amazing household cleaning hacks!
It’s happened to me more times than I care to admit. Paint on my hands, feet, in my hair and paint on my clothes! Over the years, I’ve tried and tested a million techniques for how to get paint off your clothes…and I’m happy to say, I’ve found one of the best solutions out there!
If you’re new here, you know I’m a lover of all things household cleaning. I’ve written a bunch of other posts about specific cleaning hacks such as how to actually get rid of fruit flies, the best way to clean thrift store furniture and how to get dog smells out of the couch. 
How to get Paint off your Clothes
Here’s the scenario – you brush up against something that is still wet with either latex paint, acrylic paint or chalky paint. OR even worse, you splatter paint bits all over yourself.
AAAAAHHHH!!
Step One is Do Not Panic and DO NOT rub the paint.
You want the paint to stay ‘wet’ on your clothing before you do anything AT ALL.
Step Two is to remove the soiled garment. Now here’s where I’ll say, if you’ve gotten paint on polyester or some other type of totally non-breathable fabric – you might be completely pooched. But if it’s cotton or a cotton blend, like a t-shirt, jeans, hoodie or something, this technique has worked for me 100% of the time if the paint isn’t ALL over me.
Step Three is to run the soiled area of the clothes under cool tap water. Don’t blast it, just run the water at a nice rate to soak the painty area. It should pool a little bit and gradually create a big wet spot. 
If your paint stain is ‘chunky’ or ‘thick’, as in you have raised splattery bits, this is where you want to use a kitchen sponge or pot scrubber and a VERY, VERY, light hand to gentle scrub off the top layer of paint. Try your best to not rub it in or you might not have great overall results. But if the paint is thick enough to completely hide the fabric fibres, try rubbing it with a coarse sponge first.
The Secret to Getting Paint off your Clothes
Here’s the BEST TIP – Now use regular old DISH SOAP. Squirt a bit onto the wet and soiled area of your clothing and use your fingers to just dab it into the paint. Don’t push too hard, but rub it as if you were applying moisturizer. The de-greasing agent found in most dish soaps should activate with the water to break up the paint on your clothes and start it flaking away.
Now, wring out your clothing gently and put it into a regular wash cycle as soon as possible.
I’ve rescued jeans, hoodies, t-shirts, socks … lots of things using this method! I hope it works for you!
Other Paint Removal Hacks
If you’re looking to get spray paint off your skin, Creekline House has a great tutorial for how to do that. Plus she also has a rundown of the best ways to clean your paint brushes – because that’s a whole different kettle of fish!
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