Chasing The Window Washer

Washing windows on 20-story buildings is difficult, and so is getting pictures like this one. Click to enlarge.

Chasing the window washer - By Paul Kapteyn Staff Photographer (Photos in high places): On my way into work in late April, I happened to see some window washers hanging from the roof of 100 Front St. in downtown Worcester. The 20-story building is the future home of the Telegram & Gazette. Though window washer pictures can be a dime a dozen, what made this more interesting was that these guys looked more like rappelling cliff-climbers - no platform in sight. I decided to try to get a photo of one of these fearless men from inside the building.

Little did I know what I was in for. I estimated which floor I needed to be on in order to get the photo, figuring about halfway up the building might work. I took the elevator to the 11th floor, looked out the window of the elevator lobby and saw nothing but dangling ropes. The building's designers went with fixed windows, perhaps anticipating that some crazy photographer might want to stick his head out the window. I returned to the bank of elevators.

I took the elevator up a couple of floors. Still no sign of the washer - just the dangling ropes. I squished my face against the glass trying to see if he was above or below, but no dice. Back to waiting for the elevators. I tried the 10th floor, but still saw only ropes. The movement of the ropes seemed to indicate that the washer was just below me. Of course, the elevators had run off on their own again. Press the button and wait. Go down two floors. Peering up through the window, I saw dangling feet. I took the elevator up to the 9th floor, and there he was, sitting in a harness, a bucket dangling below him.

He was attached to a window with suction cups in one hand and a tethered squeegee in the other. I grabbed a few frames and saw that he was heading to the eighth. I took the elevator to the eighth floor and waited as he worked his way down to where I was positioned. It was impressive to watch how quickly and efficiently he moved from window to window. Sunlight was streaming through the windows, so I stayed in the shadows and lined myself up with a small divider between two large panes of glass, to avoid getting a reflection of myself.

Satisfied that I had gotten a decent image, I now had to get his name. I knocked on the glass, but he apparently couldn't hear me. Repeated knocking finally got his attention, but it soon became clear that sign language is not one of my gifts. Using large block letters, I wrote in my notebook: "YOUR NAME? NEWSPAPER PHOTO" and held it up to the glass. He still apparently didn't understand what I was asking for, and just shook his head. Of course, the reflective glass probably limited his ability to see inside, and from his perspective, why would he want to try to carry on a conversation in sign language with someone while dangling from a building 100 feet off the ground?

I went back down to the first floor to speak with the security guard, who brought me to the building manager, who in turn put me in touch with the local supervisor of the cleaning company contracted by the building owners. The supervisor connected me with a representative from Fish Window Cleaning, to whom I described the person I had photographed. She knew exactly who I was talking about, and said that Mr. Carlos Lemus would be thrilled, since a photograph had just been published in the Boston Herald, showing him cleaning windows at Fenway Park in preparation for its centennial celebration. That may not be as exciting as being photographed cleaning the windows of the future home of the Worcester Telegram & Gazette. Fenway has been around for 100 years, but the T&G has been in its current building since medieval times.

Getting this image was a good reminder that the simple idea of a photograph can often turn into a much longer process. It's never just a matter of pressing a button.