How to Get Cat Pee out of a Lovesac

We all love having comfortable furniture in our homes, especially something as luxurious as Lovesac sofas. For some of us, we also enjoy sharing our homes with furry family members too. Occasionally, these two worlds collide and or beloved pets will have accidents on our beds, floors, or even couches; and this is when the cleanup can become difficult or even impossible in some cases.

Unfortunately, there’s no real method for getting cat pee out of a Lovesac. Of course, you can machine wash the cover to remove any smells or stains, but you absolutely cannot do anything about the foam.

Even if you handwash your Lovesac, the ammonia particles inherent in the cat urine will always remain. While you may not smell it, your cat eventually will, and it’s likely that they’ll pee on it again.

If you have a Lovesac, you’re one of the millions of people blessed with one of the most comfortable pieces of furniture available. It’s basically a beanbag, but it isn’t comprised of the usual little beads and beans found inside of most similar products. Durafoam is Lovesac’s proprietary stuffing for their chairs and couches; and, unsurprisingly, it’s not a material that was designed to withstand being a substitute litter box for our pets.

Quick Overview

Evaluate how much urine soaked into the Lovesac. It’s likely that you will have to throw out the inner foam.
Clean and machine wash the cover; you can treat it with spot spray and allow it to air dry when done.

Some recommendations from Lovesac along with stories and experiences from owners.
Prevent your cat from having another accident on it by covering it, keeping it out of sight, or training your cat.

Evaluate the Urine

If there’s only a little urine on the Lovesac, you might be okay to just throw the cover into the washing machine. Spray some deodorizing cleaner on the affected area of the Durafoam afterward. However, if there’s a lot of urine, you’ll simply have to throw the Durafoam away—you won’t be able to salvage it.

Cleaning the Cover

According to Lovesac, you can wash the cover on a gentle cycle in the washing machine with cold water. Ensure that you use detergent intended specifically for delicates. You can also use some fabric softener to help with the smell if you’d like.

Additionally, you can pre-treat the fabric with a stain-removing product or baking soda and vinegar. When it’s finished, allow it to hang dry. Do not put it in a dryer.

What Lovesac Recommends

Lovesac says to follow their fabric care guide, but there’s no information available on their website for such a thing. However, in Lovesac’s FAQ section, they recommend not washing their product as much as possible. Try to treat spills and stains with a damp sponge or cloth and a vacuum. Use your washing machine as a last-ditch effort for cleaning these up.

Owner Stories & Experiences

When you browse online help forums about removing cat urine from a Lovesac, it’s a nightmare. This is because the foam on the inside absorbs, traps, and holds in the smell of cat pee. Once it’s there, it’s there forever.

For those that jumped the gun and attempted to wash the foam, it dispersed the cat pee throughout the foam and destroyed the material. Additionally, any success they gained was quickly mitigated once the cat returned to the piece to pee on it again.

There are also some people who attempted to use a Shopvac or other upholstery cleaning machine to remove the stains and smells. It did work in some cases to a small extent, but the smell of the cat pee does eventually return after a time even if it doesn’t get very deep into the fibers of the foam.

How to Prevent a Cat from Peeing on Your Lovesac

When you have a Lovesac, it’s imperative to implement preventative measures. The chances of you being able to remove cat pee once it’s there will be next to impossible.

Cover It or Move It Out of Sight

As a great step towards protecting your belonging, you can always use some sort of waterproof covering over your Lovesac. This way, if your cat does pee on it, the urine will simply run off the furniture. However, this will still create a mess on the floor—this is usually far easier to clean than the Durafoam, though.

It is also possible, of course, to put a rubber or silicone mat under your Lovesac. This will protect the floor, and it’s a cinch to keep clean and remove cat urine when it appears.

If that’s too much or far too involved for your tastes, you could also simply keep your Lovesac up and out of the way when it’s not in use. This would clearly be far more effective for the smaller beanbag chairs than it would be for larger couches and sectionals.

In the case of the larger types of Lovesac furniture, covering them is your best option.

Training

The approach with benefits extending even past simply protecting your furniture, you could always try to train your cat to not pee on the Lovesac (nor anything else of value in your home). There are several techniques you can attempt in an effort to stop your cat from peeing on it. You may have to use a combination of the suggestions below, so be sure to devise a plan of action before you start your actual training regimen.

Make It Undesirable — Cats are very sensitive to scents they find gross as well as loud noises. You could place a covering onto your Lovesac that has a crazy, loud, crunchy sound to it. You could also spray something like lavender essential oil all over the Lovesac—cats hate lavender and other strong perfumes.
Use a Spray Bottle of Water — Very few cats actually like water. With a toy water gun or a spray bottle that has a long stream and covers some good distance, you can simply spray your cat every time you notice it even attempting to approach the Lovesac.
Keep It Away from Any Cat Areas — Ensure your Lovesac doesn’t stay anywhere near your cat’s food bowls or litter boxes—this includes the areas where they sleep, lounge, play, and hang out. They key here is to reduce your cat’s desire and curiosity.