Cleaning hacks: The $2 kitchen staple former Buckingham Palace cleaner used to keep royal windows sparkling

Buckingham Palace has 700 windows to keep clean but a former cleaner has revealed that nothing expensive or high tech was used in her time there.

Anne Simmons worked at the royal residence for 10 years and shared her tips with Pure Window Cleaning via The Sun.

She says the DIY cleaning solution used on palace windows requires just a small drop of something you’d find in every kitchen.

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”There’s a misconception that royal cleaning is all high-tech and high-budget, but many of the methods we used day to day were things you’d find in any ordinary British home because the goal wasn’t just to clean – it was to preserve,” she said.

Simmons never used store-bought window glass cleaners because “they leave streaks and residues on older glass”.

Instead she only ever used distilled water mixed with a drop of dishwashing liquid.

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“It cut through the grime without damaging anything,’ she added.

To make the DIY cleaner use an empty spray bottle and add distilled water, which can be found at Coles for $2.40 for a 1L bottle, and dishwashing liquid, which is available at supermarkets for as little as $2, sometimes even less.

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A microfibre cloth is recommend for use with this solution to give a sparkling finish without streaks.

But if you’ve ever found that the windows start fogging up when you clean them, Simmons has an unusual hack for that.

All you need to do is pop your microfibre cloths in the freezer, apparently wiping the windows with frozen cloths not only stops fogging and reduces static.

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Simmons mentioned another hack that was popular in the past but isn’t recommended anymore.

The ex-royal cleaner also used old newspapers to buff the glass on palace windows.

However, Window Cleaning Online says there are several downsides to the retro trick when using newspapers made today including transfer of ink and damaging glass that’s tinted or has a solar film.

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The other problems are the possibility of disintegration and scratching.

“If newspapers get too wet, they can also begin to disintegrate. This not only prevents you from achieving an effective clean but may also be counter-effective as the disintegrating newspaper may leave behind paper fibres on the window,” Window Cleaning Online wrote in a blog post.

“If there is any dirt or grit on the newspaper that you use for window cleaning, there is a potential that your windows might get scratched during the cleaning process.”

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