The easiest skirting boards for cleaning

The easiest skirting boards for cleaning are the ones that with simple profiles, like round, square edge,  edge 2, ogee, torus, chamfered etc, basically most of the profiles with less curves, cuts, and rebates. Particularly square edge, edge 2 and round are architects and designers new favorite, because they are simple, clean, modern ( as supposed to the traditional designs) and easy to maintain. Next time, when you go to a hotel, modern restaurant or  modern apartment complex you will probably see that the skirting boards they use are those simple profiles.

 

The next thing is to have some sort of finish for your skirting boards. If you use MDF, add a coat of gloss finish, if you use real wood or veneered product, add some lacquers or oil them. These finishing products not only add different layers of look and texture to your skirting boards, but also give them longer wear and protect them from scratching or bumping. Particularly if you have young children, who push around their toy pushchairs or cars , or you move your furniture around and unavoidably your children or you can bump or bash into some of the skirting boards.  And most importantly, when it comes to cleaning, it far easier to get dust, grease, and other unwanted stuff off your skirting boards.

How to clean skirting boards

A lot of you out there, probably clean your house once a week, but most of you probably don’t clean your skirting boards once a week. Yes, skirting boards and the back your radiator are often the areas got forgotten, then gradually they become your dust trap.

 

So now, here you are at the annual spring clean trying to figure out how to clean the skirting boards that you haven’t got around to clean. First of all, find out what type of material or wood you have for your skirting boards, this is simply because you don’t want to introduce a lot moisture to your skirting boards then indirectly to your wall which will cause your problem. Some pine or oak skirting boards product can even start to change shape or curl up with a lot of moisture.

 

Second of all, what finish do you have on your skirting boards. If you have oil, lacquering, paint or gloss then you don’t need to worry as much as say your skirting boards don’t have any finishing products on them, and only have the raw materials. Because raw materials soak up moisture far quicker than if they have some layers of finish on them.

 

After you determined the type and finish of your skirting boards then you can decide what to use. If you have unfinished materials, then make sure you don’t use any water content cleaning solutions. Simple dusting and dry wiping can get rid of a lot of the dust, or use the vacuum to go over it as well as dusting.

 

If your skirting boards have some sort of finish on them, it doesn’t mean that you don’t have to worry about the moisture, only that you can use a small amount moist if it is necessary. You can start to vacuum majority of the dust first, then use a mix cleaning solution of water and soda powder and slightly damp the cloth, and run the cloth through all the profiling sections of the skirting boards which seems to trap most of the dust. If your skirting boards in the kitchen have grease on them, you can add a drop or two dish soap into the mix solution. If your skirting boards have mould or mildew on them, add a drop of bleach into the mix cleaning solution. However, if the mould or mildew come back within a short space of time, you may need to check whether there leaks or major damp behind the skirting board.

 

Once you have spring cleaned your skirting boards, just make a habit of giving them a quick vacuum when you vacuum your floor.