If you love antiques, and love to use them in your home, then you have likely run into the problem of a musty dresser.

You know what I mean, you bring home this gorgeous antique, solid wood dresser, and you put your clothes in the drawers, and then over time you realize that you smell like a museum!

If you have cleaned your dresser, and it still smells musty, then try this:

Place a small container of baking soda in the drawers, like the type you would normally put in your refrigerator to absorb smells, you will be amazed at how fast this works.

The other cause for this, is that most solid wood antique dressers, were built with sold wooden backs, and there is just no ventilation for the drawers, so unless you want to leave all your drawers open (like your teenagers do!) then another way, you may not like as much, but does work, is to drill small holes in the back of this solid backing to allow for some ventilation.

Try the baking soda first, you may need to always leave a small container in the corner of your drawer, just sit it in a small box to wall it off from your underwear!

You can always use fresheners but they will just mask the odor, so now you will smell like rose musty, or citrus musty, or flower musty, so its best to use something that absorbs odor, you can also get commercial products that do this, but the baking soda is your cheapest and easiest way, so try it first. You don't want your antique dresser to just be an ornament, you want to use it.