Spring cleaning isn’t just a Western habit — cultures around the world mark spring or the new year with deep-cleaning rituals that blend practical hygiene with symbolic fresh starts. From Passover’s removal of every speck of chametz, to sweeping out bad luck before Chinese New Year, to the near-universal custom of removing shoes indoors, these traditions carry genuine cleaning wisdom. Here are seven worth knowing about.
There’s real logic behind the timing. Historically, homes got filthy over winter from coal and wood fires, oil lamps, and gas lights, with windows kept shut against the cold — so the return of warm weather and longer days made spring the natural time to throw open the shutters and scrub. There’s even a biological nudge: our production of melatonin, the sleep hormone triggered by darkness, keeps us sleepier and less energetic through the dark winter months, so we’re somewhat wired to put off big cleaning until the light returns.
1. Cleaning in Christian tradition
Shrove Tuesday — also called Mardi Gras (“Fat Tuesday”) or pancake day — is when indulgent foods are cleared from the home before Lent. To avoid waste, rich ingredients like sugar, butter, and eggs are used up, and pancakes became the traditional way to do it. Greek Orthodox Christians similarly clean house in the week before Lent and feast on the last of their rich food on “Kathari Deftera,” or Clean Monday.
2. Cleaning for Passover
In Jewish tradition, Passover celebrates the Israelites’ freedom from slavery, and leavened products — chametz — are forbidden during the festival, recalling that the fleeing Israelites had no time to let their bread rise.
Chametz covers foods made from five grains that rise in water, and by custom even stray flour dust can become chametz if it mixes with water. So before Passover, families clean their homes thoroughly to remove every speck of dust, followed by a ritual declaration disowning any chametz that may have been missed.
3. Cleaning for Chinese New Year
The Lunar New Year falls between late January and early February, and its first day marks the start of spring. By custom, cleaning the home on the last day of the old year sweeps out bad luck and welcomes good fortune. Then people deliberately avoid cleaning during the first days of the new year, so as not to sweep that good fortune away.
4. Thai cleaning for Songkran
Thailand rings in its traditional new year in April with Songkran. Customs vary by region, but in the central region people clean their homes to air and freshen them, and pour water mixed with herbs and fragrance over images of the Buddha for blessings. The runoff water was traditionally collected and poured over monks and elders as a further blessing — and water remains central to the festival, with Bangkok famously turning into a citywide, good-natured water fight.
5. “Shaking the house” for Nowruz
The Persian New Year, Nowruz, is a time for deep cleaning across the Middle East, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and beyond. The pre-new-year cleaning is known as “shaking the house” (khane-takani).
Beyond cleaning inside and out, homes are often repainted and then decorated with fresh flowers like roses and jasmine, with garlands hung around doors and windows — all meant to invite good luck in the year ahead.
6. Guatemala’s Quema del Diablo
The dramatic “burning of the devil” has roots in Roman Catholic tradition: the day before the feast of the Immaculate Conception, Guatemalans burn an effigy of the devil to make way for Mary.
Alongside the effigies, people sweep their houses and clear out trash to purify their homes before the feast. The custom of burning rubbish reportedly began because wealthier households hung lanterns ahead of the feast, and those who couldn’t afford them burned trash instead. Today homes are swept and cleared so the devil has “no hiding place” — a literal and symbolic clean. (As a practical note, open trash-burning is now widely discouraged for the air pollution it creates.)
7. Taking your shoes off indoors
Not every cleaning tradition is tied to a holiday. In much of the world — northern and eastern Europe, the Balkans, most of Asia, and the Arab world — removing your shoes indoors is simply the norm, even as a guest.
The reasoning is pure hygiene: it keeps outdoor dirt — and the bacteria and contaminants shoes pick up — from being tracked across your floors. In Japan it extends to many schools, workplaces, and restaurants, with house slippers provided and a separate pair reserved just for the bathroom. Many religious buildings, including mosques and Hindu and Buddhist temples, likewise require shoes to be removed as a mark of respect. It’s a small habit with an outsized payoff for keeping a home clean — one worth adopting wherever you live. (Decorative floor patterns like South Asia’s rangoli, made from colored powder, are another beautiful way some cultures dress a freshly cleaned threshold.)
Spring cleaning can be cathartic whatever your background — a chance to reinvent your space, declutter, and enjoy your home again. Whatever your reason for wanting a fresher home this spring, from tradition to simply turning over a new leaf, Pro Housekeepers can help — get in touch to book your first appointment.
