We clean Pasadena's old Craftsman houses

Craftsman houses hold dust in the woodwork

A lot of Pasadena's houses went up before the Second World War. Bungalow Heaven is street after street of Craftsman bungalows, and the blocks near the Arroyo Seco hold bigger shingled homes from the same era. Inside, they are full of wood: built-in china cabinets, box beam ceilings, picture rails and wide window casings. Every one of those ledges catches dust, and a quick pass with a feather duster only moves it somewhere else.

The floors in these houses are often the original oak or fir, refinished more than once over the years. Old boards have small gaps between them, and water left on the floor runs down into those seams. The wood swells and the edges of each board start to curl up. So we damp mop wood floors with a cloth wrung out almost dry, and we wipe up any wet spot as we go. Area rugs get rolled back so the grit underneath gets vacuumed too.

Bathrooms in these older houses have their own problems. Many still have small white hexagon tile on the floor, which means a lot of grout lines for dirt to settle into. Pedestal sinks and old porcelain tubs scratch if you scrub them with a harsh powder, and those scratches hold stains from then on. We scrub the grout with a stiff brush and use a soft pad on porcelain, so the surface stays smooth.

• Dust picture rails and the tops of built-ins
• Damp mop old oak and fir floors
• Roll back rugs and vacuum the grit underneath
• Scrub hexagon tile grout with a stiff brush
• Clean old porcelain with a soft pad

Foothill winds push dust into Pasadena homes

Pasadena sits right at the foot of the San Gabriel Mountains, far enough from the ocean that summers run hot and dry. In the fall, the Santa Ana winds come down out of the canyons and blow fine dust across the whole city. Old wood windows and doors almost never seal tight. So the dust gets inside even when every window is shut, and a day later it shows as a gray film on dark furniture.

The goal with that dust is to pick it up and carry it out of the house. We work from the top of the room down, with damp microfiber cloths that hold the dust instead of flicking it into the air. Window sills and sliding door tracks get cleaned out, because that is where grit piles up after a wind. On a wood floor that grit does real harm, since shoes grind it into the finish like sandpaper.

Spring brings a different kind of dust. Pasadena has a lot of big street trees and old oaks, and their pollen settles on sills and patio doors as a yellow film. In a bad fire season, fine ash can drift down from the hills as well. Ash smears if you wipe it dry, so we vacuum it first and then wipe the surface with a damp cloth. Both get tracked in on shoes, so the floor just inside each door gets a second pass.

We also clean Pasadena offices and shops

Old Pasadena and the stretch of Colorado Boulevard east of it are lined with small shops and offices, many in older brick buildings. We do office and workplace cleaning, and we do sanitation cleaning for small businesses and boutique stores. That work is different from cleaning a house, because far more people pass through. More hands touch a shop's door handles and counters in one day than a family touches in a week.

In a boutique, the busy spots are the counter, the card reader, the door glass at hand height and the fitting room mirrors. In an office, they are desks, phones, the break room sink and the fridge handle. Sanitizing is its own step. Wiping sanitizer over grime does very little, because the grime shields the surface underneath. The dirt comes off first, then the sanitizer goes on a clean surface and sits long enough to work.

Shop floors get dirty fastest. Every customer walks in with whatever was on the sidewalk, and on a windy day that includes foothill dust and leaves. We vacuum the entry mat, then mop from the back of the store toward the door. That way nobody walks across the part that is already clean. The glass on the front door gets wiped last, because it is the first thing a customer touches.

Getting a price in Pasadena

Call (310) 736-5266 Monday to Saturday from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM, or request an estimate online with the form on this page. Tell us how many bedrooms and bathrooms the house has, and whether you want a standard clean or a deep clean. If the floors are old wood, mention that too. For a shop or office, tell us what kind of business it is. We will give you a free quote, so you know the price before any work starts.