Some jokester here at work thought it would be funny to spray my (upholstered) chair with perfume. Thank Og I’m not allergic! It’s a bit overpowering though, and I was wondering if anything (other than time) would take the smell away. At least it smells ok.
He has since apologized for such a childish prank, BTW.
This is horrible. Perfumes are often fairly toxic, with irritating substances like amines in them. Beats me why they’re allowed almost everyplace and yet people worry about so many other chemicals.
You might try K2R or a similar spot lifter. You want something that will wet the surface of the chair with a solvent, and also coat it with light fluffy dust particles, so that the solvent wicks out through the dust before it evaporates, leaving the more slowly evaporating perfume behind embedded in the surface of the dust where you can vacuum it off.
You might also try sunlight and wind. Take your chair out to the desert for a summer. Or put it in a big oven. These things will help, and more practical things like these could also help too.
You might wrap it in aluminum foil with a vacuum cleaner hose buried at the seat, and run the vacuum for a few days. The more air you drag through the upholstery, the more dilute the remaining perfume becomes.
If you can come by a short wave ultraviolet lamp, like the 253 line of Mercury, that would help break it down.
If it were mine, I’d dip it in solvent, treat it with ozone and ionizing radiation, then take it overseas and bury it.
While those are some good ideas, they seem a little…overengineered. First I’d try sprinkling the whole chair with baking soda before you leave. Let it sit overnight and vacuum it off the next morning.
You can also try zeolite clay and/or charcoal, both available at pet stores.
Well, he’s an engineer. What did you expect? 
Can you just ask TPTB for a new chair, and move yours into a conference room or something?
I’m going to try Febreze. If that doesn’t work, I might try to get a new chair. I might try the baking soda thing, too. But a vacuum cleaner isn’t really available, and bringing mine seems a bit overboard. I actually had another guy say, “Chill out!” I wasn’t even yelling or anything! He’s the office dickhead, anyway. :rolleyes:
Maybe I’ll trade Perfume guy for his chair. Or Dickhead. Shouldn’t bother him, right?
It really pissed me off, though. I had a headache by the end of the day.
Seriously, Perfume guy should be forced to trade with you or get you a new chair.
Have you considered asking that he trade chairs with you? To my mind, that would be a real apology.
I suspected as much! I grew up in a household with three of them. You wouldn’t believe the lengths you had to go to to open a cabinet, sometimes!
Wouldn’t Febreze leave all the bad stuff there & just numb the nose?
:wikipedia:
OK, not exactly. Anyway, I find the smell & feel of Febreze’d molecules annoying. I like the foil’n’vacuum idea, I’ll remember that.
>Well, he’s an engineer.
The Hell I am - I’m a physicist.
If you spray some liquid onto the chair such that it soaks in, or rub some powder into it so that it spreads through the depth of the upholstery, it may be able to do more than just letting things air out. But anything that will sit outside the surface ought to have the same diffusion limit that would control simple airing, and may have further limits.
I would also recommend Oxy-Clean or Hydrogen Peroxide if it doesn’t bleach the chair. Some of these molecules can probably be oxidized to a less volatile compound.
I forgot this thread!
I came in this morning and it was just a very faint smell. i sprayed Febreze anyway, and got to smell Febreze for about an hour. The smell is gone now.
Thanks for all your suggestions!