A cut glass whiskey glass should go to the sink after the pour, not to a crowded basin in the morning. Grooves hold whisky, water, and soap. The rim and the base hold drops. This is a wash you can do in a few minutes with a soft sponge and a lint-free cloth.
EDO 1834 keeps the method simple so you will actually use it. Hold the base. Soft sponge only. Rinse fully. Dry before the glass sits.
If you want the shorter house rule, read How to Care for Cut Glass first. This post is the step-by-step.
Before you start
Clear the sink of pans and utensils. A tap or a fork will chip a rim faster than a fall to a towel. Lay a folded cloth in the basin if you want a quiet landing. Fill a bowl or one side of the sink with warm water and a drop of mild dish soap. The water should be warm, not sudden. Do not take a cold glass from the refrigerator and hit it with hot water.
Use a soft sponge or a soft cloth. Do not use a scouring pad, a grit sponge, or dry powder. Those will scratch the cut. You do not need a special glass detergent. You do need a clean towel that does not shed.
If the glass held a sugary mix or an Old Fashioned, do not let it dry on the counter. Sugar in a groove is harder after an hour than after a minute. Rinse once as soon as the glass is empty, then wash.
Hold, wash, rinse
Hold the base in one hand. Wash with the other. Do not hold the rim and twist. Do not pin the mouth against the tap. The base can take the grip. The rim cannot.
Wash the inside first, then the outside. On the outside, follow the grooves. A fingertip in a soft cloth will reach a cut that a wide sponge skips. Wash the underside of the base. That ring collects film and then prints a mark on the shelf.
Rinse in clean warm water until the glass feels squeak-free and you cannot see soap in a facet. Soap left in a cut dries as haze. If your tap is hard, a final rinse in filtered water will leave fewer spots. That is optional. A full dry is not.
Grooves, rim, and base
Grooves are where the wash succeeds or fails. Look at the glass in the light before you dry. If a line still looks greasy, wash that line again. Do not scrape it with a knife or a brush with metal in the ferrule.
The rim needs a light pass only. Too much pressure here is how chips start. If lipstick or oil is on the rim, a drop of soap on the cloth is enough. Rinse the rim inside and out.
The base is thick and easy to ignore. It will spot if you stand a wet glass on a wood shelf. After the rinse, invert the glass briefly over the sink so the base can drain, then turn it and dry the foot. If a drop is trapped in a hollow foot, touch it with a corner of the cloth.
Dry and put away
Dry with a lint-free cloth or a clean microfiber made for glass. Kitchen linen leaves fluff in the pattern. Work from the rim down the cuts, then the interior, then the base. Hold the base while you dry the bowl so the cloth does not slip the glass from your hand.
Do not air-dry as the main method if you can avoid it. Air-dry leaves mineral rings in the cuts, especially with hard water. If you must leave the glass, leave it on a cloth, upright, and finish it before you sleep.
Store upright, apart from other rims. Do not stack. Do not set the glass face down on a stone counter. Read How to Care for Cut Glass for storage and heat. If the dry glass still looks cloudy, read Cloudy Cut Glass: Mineral Film vs Etching before you try a stronger cleaner.
We do not call the glass dishwasher-safe. Hand wash is the method we stand behind. Shop whiskey glasses when you want the form this wash was written for.
Related reading: How to Care for Cut Glass · Cloudy Cut Glass: Mineral Film vs Etching · Care · Whiskey Glasses · Tumblers · The First Pour