Let the sunshine reach into every corner of your home. Pictures: iStock

It’s time to get that grey veil off those windows and let the sunshine reach into every corner of your home. 

Safety first. To climb up to lower-storey windows, you’ll need a perfectly detailed, solid set of steps or a step ladder. Stay off the top two to three rungs (including any low steps – it only takes a short fall to fracture an ankle). Having checked its integrity and opened and locked the bracing, only use the platform of steps or ladder for hanging your bucket and staging tools – I like the varieties with voids and trays for tools - handy. A sexy little tool belt is perfect for holstering your squeegee and getting some over-the-hedge attention from appreciative passers-by. Ideally, once you have to go up any steps – it’s far wiser to have someone else at home and on hand to hear you fall like a wee tree in the forest.

Upstairs windows with a flip or pivot mechanisms are safe for adults to clean from the inside, but don’t lean out ever, and don’t wander into detailing the exterior window surrounds or sills unless they are easily and safely accessible. Leave second and third storeys to the professionals and their extending poles. In the case of tall buildings, say in a terrace, get together with neighbours and hire in a reputable individual with a cherry picker and sound indemnity insurance for ultimate peace of mind. Some firms will offer a gutter clean in a neatly priced bundle on the same day.

Window cleaning is physically taxing, break it up if you feel the need into 2-3 outings. Plate glass heats up and evaporates solutions in seconds. Choose an overcast, warmer but not hot day, where solutions will not dry instantly into swooping smears and chalky dribbles. Streaking is inevitable, there’s always going to be that second pass, even with a great technique. This is an exercise in profound patience.

The tools you use to distribute water and to shine up windows are as important as the solutions. With applied pressure, cheap sponges and squeegees will rarely last more than two outings. You really do get what you pay for. Unger squeegee T-bars which can be matched to extension poles from €12.50, with window washers at €14.50 and larger 35mm water sleeves at €21, screwfix.ie. With typically fogged-up, grubby spring windows, we’re making up our polishing solution but dusting and then wiping down the windows first. Make up a 5l bucket of warm water with a mean, a tiny squirt of washing-up liquid - biodegradable, and gentle on the hands. I favour Ecover Lemon & Aloe (€5.30 for 950ml), which uses naturally derived ingredients, smells fantastic, and won’t hurt wooden frames.

Next - prepare your polishing spray. Natural brews that don’t work? Mrs Hinch’s “tea-brew”: useless in my experience. Pure water: worse than useless (with a trace of hard minerals in the water, the windows will be filthy on exit). A squirt of lemon: next to useless (used alone). The effective, classic vinegar/water or any sprayed solution is generally the second polishing step unless you are simply putting a gleam on relatively clean windows. Going natural, a 1:3 solution of distilled white vinegar and water made up in a 0.5l plastic spray bottle, applied with a newspaper or directly to the glass, is a classic natural recipe. A splash of lemon juice adds a valuable punch – a dart from your plastic Jiffy lemon.

Other useful bits of kit? Coffee filters have a nice nap to them for gently shining the windows after the damp cleaning. That paper seam fits perfectly into the edges of the seals fitted to your hand like a glove puppet. Newspaper scrunched into balls is a classic for the final pass – always keep a heap inside a protective, closed plastic bag around the garage to keep them clean, dry and dust free – brilliant for 1000 jobs.

To start. Walk around the house and remove any obstructions like planter pots and horticultural debris that could send you face down on the limestone slabs when you’re distracted by the flash of your fabulous panes. Having positioned your ladder on stable, level ground, dust down the window and sill. Skip this, and you’ll redistribute loose material as you work. 

A soft broom or pan brush (soft enough to rub on the back of your hand) can be drifted over the window to snag webs and loose debris. If you meet sticky hard debris like paint spatter, don’t scrub at glass with more than a “scrim cloth” or the edge of a credit card. A little WD-40 spray lubricant with a plastic glass scraper should be enough.

We then move on to stage two - wipe/washing the window with a sponge window sleeve on a T-bar with a netted surface to add a little traction. I like to then remove the water with a cable-free rechargeable Karcher window vacuum (from €53 for a WV 1 at B&Q). Window vacuums are brilliant devices for cleaning showering panels inside windows and glass, and sipping down condensation in your car or camper. Otherwise, following a variety of swirling, balletic S motions with a sponge applicator for the slightly soapy water, use single round or straight motions with a short rubber-edged squeegee to take the water down and away.

If you’re right-handed start at the top left-hand corner. The best hack I’ve found this year? Lick a dry micro-fibre cloth down the edges of the frame to create a dry zone before you start with the rubber set on the dry area. This prevents you from driving water back into the seals. Wipe off the edge of the rubber regularly. With washing and the rubber, overlap your passes, expecting to return for any lingering marks with a window leather, newspaper or coffee filter. Everyone finds their favoured technique after a couple of outings. Change your soapy water as soon as it discolours.

With the windows now actively drying, we smartly put on that final, streak-free shine. This means working on one window one at a time, start to finish – don’t move on or the tracery of smears will bake onto the glass. Water tends to lodge in the top edge of rubber seals and then makes a sneaky run for it after you’re dragged yourself and your kit to the next window or door. Leave a few minutes aside for a polish to each window.

For a light clean or final polish, your vinegar solution will neutralise alkaline substances including limescale and is an anti-fungal agent and de-greaser. Apply sparingly with your spray bottle to the glass or onto a cloth (wear gloves) and wipe off with a soft, dry, immaculately clean microfibre cloth or balls of newspaper. Side-to-side motions, followed by an up-and-down boogie – idea. Mind those moisture-sipping edges are not winking with water. Keep any vinegar mix off stained wood window frames if possible.

If you prefer commercial sprays with mysterious petrochemical ingredients, ensure the product is pH neutral and put a paper covid mask on to spare your lungs. The spray will inevitably drift or bounce back onto your face – it’s a given, even on a still day. Save the degreasing products for PVC window frames – don’t get it on the glass, and keep it off your skin, even if it’s solvent free. 

Spring cleaning is the time to do a survey of your windows and their surrounds. Inspect the condition of the frame, the seals and sills, and finish the day by lightly lubricating the working mechanism on any opening elements.

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