Tailoring for Professional Looking Curtains and Draperies

Tailoring for Professional Looking Curtains and Draperies

JLF there is any one single key to turning out tailored, professional looking curtains and draperies, it is measuring accurately before you start. Count on having enough material to avoid a skimpy result, so that you won't be haunted as you go along by that nervous feeling that you're not going to have enough material to provide full hems and ample trim. Remember particularly that if you use a hard-to-match color or an exclusive print, your fabric supplier may not have any more material in stock when you discover that you've underestimated your needs; and to avoid needless delays once you've begun, be sure you have sufficient yardage. You can always use material you have left over for pillow flounces, slipcover trim, valances, tiebacks, and so forth. On the other hand, when measuring don't be too lavish, or you may end up with too much material in your draperies or curtains with that clumsy, home-made look. As with every other art from cooking to painting the trick is to strike a happy balance.

Use a steel tape or yardstick for measuring your windows. A dressmaker's measuring tape will not assure an accurate measurement. But when you come to measuring your material, a yardstick or steel tape may stretch your fabric, so use your cloth tape. Lay the tape measure right on the material so that it will be in line with the edge you are measuring.

Tailoring for Professional Looking Curtains and Draperies

It goes without saying that you've made your decision as to what type of draperies you plan to have before you purchase your fabric. And before you shop for materials you want to have your measurements very firmly in mind. In fact, you will benefit from keeping a little notebook for measurements window measurements, size of valance, cornice, or swag you'll want to make, and how much material you'll need for the glass curtains, the draperies, the valance, the lining, etc. You can also enter in this book comparative prices on fabrics and hardware. Before you shop then, you will have measured the window and approximated the length and width of curtains and draperies, and in addition the allowance you will want to make for casings, headings, shrinkage, hems, and other details.

Tailoring for Professional Looking Curtains and Draperies

The first step in measuring is to measure each window in a room. Sometimes even windows right next to one another are of different heights, especially in older apartments and often even in new homes where some structural detail may have caused the builder to place the windows at different levels. You may find as great a variation as two inches, and since one advantage in having draperies is that they can conceal structural unevenness in a room, you will want to know whether you have such a problem.

Measurements you will need for each window are 1) the width from trim to trim; 2) the length from top window sash to sill; 3) the length from top window sash to just below the apron; 4) the length from top window sash to floor; 5) the length from above the window frame to floor; and 6) for draperies, the width from outside the window frame to baseboard or floor. Measurements will depend on what type of window treatment you plan. On the whole, it is possible to generalize that glass curtains generally require measurements for within the window frame, whereas draperies, which are hung from above the window, also extend below it.