Heavy-weight French blackout shades

Upholstery fabrics make stunning shades, and I have a few techniques for working with the extra bulk.

These shades are extra bulky because they are lined with French blackout.

Double side hems, the default standard, would've been really thick, so I improvised to create a single hem.

 For French blackout, interlining and dense black cotton sateen are layered between the face fabric and white sateen lining.

I fold the layered lining, then cut while still folded, to grade the layers and avoid a blunt, thick edge.

To reduce bulk, instead of a double side hem, I sewed twill tape to the edges, then hand-hemmed.  (I always hand-sew side hems when I use interlining.)  One of the two shades was just 3" less than the width of the fabric, so I didn't have enough to make a good hem anyhow, without piecing it, which would've been even bulkier.  I kept the selvedge and sewed the tape over it.  For the other shade, I trimmed down the side hem and added twill tape to create a single hem.

  In this picture you can also see how severely I graded the bottom hem to keep the white lining from bubbling up from the bottom fold.

It looks pretty cool, I think!

I baste the layers before stapling bulky fabrics to a board.  This helps them grade themselves as they fold over the board edge.  Since a shade is flat all the way across, I don't cut out the inner layers of interlining as I would with a treatment that is pleated onto a board, where thick layers build up and look lumpy.

I'm loving the new grey lining.  It's available from both Angel's and Hanes.

Hybrid shades

These are the widest I've ever made this hybrid shade, a cross between a London and a relaxed shade..  London shades droop too much in the center to be used on wide windows, but with the addition of a lift line in the center section, the long point is controlled.
If this style had a center pleat, it would simply be a balloon shade with tails, or a double London shade.  

This woven upholstery weight fabric is French blackout lined.
The railroaded fabric is pattern-matched at the pleats.  With a 14" repeat,  that is a LOT of fabric in each pleat.
These shades are quite heavy, but stationary.  Their success lies in the beautiful dressing at the installation.

Grosgrain and French blackout

Four rows of grosgrain ribbon: this is why I got a Dofix!  Well, one of many reasons.  But grosgrain ribbon application was near the top of my reason list. 

With the many widths to choose from, the tape fit from edge to edge.   We marked the finished width with blue tape and then applied the ribbon, so we knew the lines were symmetrical without any fussing.

French blackout lining adds such substance to a roman shade.  I love how it's thick yet sleek. Although adhesive tape plays important roles in the workroom, when it comes to shades with interlining or French blackout, we always hand-sew side hems.  The bottom hem is reinforced with fusible buckram to encourage a straight bottom line.  A weight bar tube is hidden in the hem.  This is the essence of the Leatherwood shade method.

The fat folds make me smile :)
We left the shades hanging in the workroom for a day to let the folds train.  

Afterwards, these beautiful shades went to their forever home.

French Blackout shade with contrast banding

Every time I make a shade, I tweak my method a little bit.  I was concerned about making certain the contrast band on this shade to stays nice and crisp. 

I didn't take individual step-by-step photos of the basic construction, because there are plenty of those on the blog.  Instead, here you can see it deconstructed.
The fabrics were pretty stable, but this shade was French blackout lined, so it was bulky.  I doubled up the fusible buckram in the hem, and I fused the weight bar tube to it. 

When I turned up the hem, it was incredibly solid and secure.

 

I hand-sewed the hem before adding the bottom row of rings and inserting the weight bar.  Even though the weight bar tube is fused to the buckram, it's essential that the stitches for the rings go through the tube.  The stitching also must go all the way to the end of the hem, not stop at the ring.

The back looks amazing!

 

Oh, and the front does too :)

Multiple French Blackout shades

Following up from my last post, I want to share how I speed-produced the three cute French blackout shades with the pleated grosgrain ribbon trim.

Making multiples of small shades is easy with the gridded canvas table cover.  I can line them all up sideways on the table and pretend they are all one shade.  Of course I still have to do all the steps!- but I can do the same step for all the shades at once.

I first sewed the trim to the bottom of all three, using Dofix to first baste it into place.  The trim was machine sewn, then the facing which is the back hem and weight bar pocket.

Repeating this photo, you can see that all three linings, rough-cut, were layered onto the shades and trimmed at the bottom, tucked under the facing seam.

The side hems were pressed then the linings trimmed 1/8" from the crease to grade the layers.

With the side hems finished, the bottoms were all completed at once.  Fusible buckram on the hem stabilizes the bottom, and weight bar tubing is secured to the buckram, before turning the hem up.

All three tabled-

and ready for rings!

French blackout with no pinholes of light

I have another way to eliminate pinholes of light in blackout shades.
These are French blackout lined.

As most of you know, French blackout is a sandwiching technique: face fabric, interlining, black sateen, and lining, which provides a lush product that is also blackout.  It can used for shades, draperies, or top treatments.   Here you can see the layers.  I've laid out two shades side by side on my gridded table.

Using a purple disappearing pen, I drew a grid on the back of the shade for ring placement.

At each attachment spot, I sewed the ring OVER a tiny "bandaid" of Silky Blackout lining.  You can see how the needle insertion points are staggered, so that the holes in the shade are blacked out by the "bandaid" and the hole in the "bandaid' is centered between those two points, so that all the holes are blacked out by another blackout layer.

I dabbed glue on each side of the bandaid to hold it down and neaten it up.

The bandaids are about the size of a Ring Lock, so they are barely noticeable.  What do you think of this?

French blackout roman shades

I hadn't made a French blackout shade in awhile.... now I have a little surge of them coming up.
French blackout consists of four layers: the face fabric, white interlining, black sateen, and white lining.  If the black sateen is a tight, dense weave, it will block all light from coming through.  There still might be dots of light where the rings are sewn, but they're fainter than with regular plain blackout lining.  And the four layers make the shade wonderfully substantial.

I like to make French blackout shades with ribs.  The ribs give some structure to the layered fabrics.  The finger guard on the Juki presser foot is the perfect guide for making rib pockets just the size I want them.

Interlining is layered first, then tightly woven black sateen.  The black provides the opacity to keep the light from coming through.  White interlining separates the black sateen from the face fabric to keep it from looking ashen.

The prepared lining is laid out and hand slip-stitched to the side hem, then rings and ladder tape are sewn at each rib pocket.   We press the pockets downward, and catch the pocket with the ring stitch through all layers.

French blackout, whether used for shades or drapery, is more labor intensive, but the result is luxurious and effective.  This shade feels like a piece of furniture!

Fab Fabric Friday

Is it Friday yet???  If it's not, it should be!
I'm running so behind on blog posts that I think I'll bump Friday up a day.

This cityscape from Kravet is one of the most fab fabrics I've ever used.

All the shades for this home (we've done 33 so far!) have been French blackout lined, with ribs, and Rollease clutch lift mechanisms.

The rib pockets are sewn to the inside of the lining, which becomes the outermost of four layers of fabric, along with black sateen, interlining, and face fabric.

After raising and lowering just once, these folds were perfectly trained.
You can see that this fabric has a high sheen- it's almost satin-like in finish though not in weave.

For a lower level guest bedroom, three shades in a row provide privacy, darkening, and urban pizazz.