A glass substrate is provided with a durable and abrasion-resistant water-repellent surface, by coating a surface of the substrate with a silica solution which has been subjected to a two-step aging process, respectively in the presence of basic and acidic catalysts, which is then thermally treated to provide a coarse-surfaced silica layer including fine crystalline silica particles, which is then coated with a water-repellent layer made of fluoroalkylsilane.