Pleat, ripple, wave, and grommet to pattern- our workroom standard

What used to be a rarity has become a workroom standard: pleating to pattern.  Whether pleated, rippled, waved, or grommeted to pattern, many workrooms like ours have come to  consider this high-end detail their default standard.
My very kind installer Tim made sure to point this detail out to the homeowner when we installed these grommet draperies designed by Denise Wenacur. 

Pleating to pattern requires a level of expertise and experience that not all workrooms achieve.  It requires a significant investment in time to plan and test the plan.  Some factory workrooms are capable of this detail, but it incurs an upcharge since the project must be taken out of the normal work flow.  In our workroom, we start every project assuming we're going to pleat to pattern if it's possible.

Grommet panels are, you know, scary to make.  It's definitely unnerving to spend hours sewing beautiful panels then cut huge holes in them.  You really need to know you've got it right!  Because of the heavy embroidery, we planned the panels from the top down, to take advantage of the one clear space in the motif that would accommodate a #15 grommet.  Lead edges and returns must be planned from the center of the hole to assure perfect fit.  Because a shade was outside-mounted behind the panels, the lead edge had to be small enough to allow the shade fabric to stack up.  Seams must be planned to fall inside the folds, not at the front.  All that attention to detail is worth it for the striking results!

Since adjustments can't be made at installation, because of those huge holes in the fabric that are a DONE DEAL and can't be changed, we hung the panels overnight in the workroom to let them stretch out to their maximum length.  I'm so grateful to have plenty of room to do this.  Yes, I know, the pole is angling down from the weight of the drapery, making them look lopsided- but I know they aren't.

We bought a second grommet press to streamline the setting process.  John rigged up a dual-purpose table and I covered it with retro oilcloth.  In the center is the cutter for 3/8" weight bars, which can be removed when the table is being used for grommets.

With two presses, we can cut and set without having to cut all holes first and then re-calibrate the press for the setter.  This streamlines the grommet setting process.  Thank you, John.

We've had more grommet drapery jobs in the past year than in the past decade- it's a clean, modern look that is increasing in popularity, and I'm glad we've become proficient in fabricating this style.

Details on the 158" shade

There's a lot of detail I'd like to share about the 158" shade featured in last Friday's post.

The fabric was railroaded- it wasn't perfectly symmetrical in both directions, but nearly, and the repeat was small in either case, so I thought it would be best to have no visible seams.  Instead, we seamed it horizontally and hid the seam under a fold.  Figuring out the logistics was trickier than I thought it would be!  Luckily I got it right, whew.  The repeat is just 4.5" so the folds are a little smaller and closer together than I usually plot for hobbled shades.

I did catch a break on marking the fabric for sewing the tape and rings.  I used a lovely double-wide cotton sateen from Hanes, and could just see through it enough to make the marks by pattern instead of having to measure.  THAT was a huge plus- it not only saved time, but also assured accuracy.  I took this photo of the first shade as pattern placement reference for the following two.

The Rollease Skyline clutch on a 1.5" tube provided a strong lift system.  After using this tube a lot recently for both clutch AND spring lift systems, I think I will now remember without having to look it up: screw eyes for clutch, NO screw eyes for spring.

Another thing I think I finally will remember without having to look it up: for reverse mount hobbled shades, DO NOT put the grommet through the tape!  I had to wiggle the tape free out of every grommet in order to make slight adjustments to the board line.  I also finally got smart while making the adjustments and instead of unstapling, I used a blunt instrument to nudge a bit of lining upward and stapled it to the back of the board.

Did you see what tool I'm using there?  It's our new Milwaukee cordless, battery-operated staple gun!  My hands are no longer able to operate an old-fashioned manual staple gun, and the shade was too far away for the compressor hose, so this new toy I mean tool came in very handy!

The tube, at 158", was too long to safely use without support.  Luckily Rollease has introduced a splice- the Easy-Link.  This allows the tube to be split in half and spliced, with the splice doing double duty as a support bracket.

For a fail-safe during transportation, we used cable tie mounts at each end of each tube, just in case the tube came out of the bracket.  It can't fall far, because it's all strung up to the shade, but it saved some annoyance when it DID happen and we needed to put it back together.  Please note: we snipped the cable ties loose once the shade was installed, because they would add resistance to the lift if they stayed in place.
There are two types of cable tie mounts: one is all in one piece; the other sticks on then you secure it with a screw- that's the one we wound up using.

Oh, and another thing.  If you read the previous post, you might remember that the soft cornices didn't quite fit in the corner, and I had to take them back to adjust the ends.  I made a piece of welting on "wings" with velcro, and velcroed it in between where the new ends met.  I forgot to take a photo of the welt with wings, sorry.

I wish I could say that the pattern flowed around the corner because of meticulous planning, but really it was serendipity that the pattern on the two ends created a near match.  Sometimes luck is better than skill!

It WAS skill, however, and not a bit of luck involved, that the pattern matched preciselty from the soft cornice to the shade!  And I'll gladly take full credit for THAT, as well as the perfect pleat-to-pattern :)

Flat-back blackout reverse mount hobbled shades

Flat-back blackout reverse mount hobbled shades.  That's a mouthful, right?

It's important to remember, when talking about "blackout" lining, that it is the LINING that is blackout, and not the TREATMENT.  The lining is blackout, but the treatment is ROOM-DIMMING.  The only real blackout treatment would be plywood nailed over the window.  Just about any window treatment will have points of light bleed.
Even this three-layer blackout treatment from a few years ago- blackout drapery, shade, and cornice- allowed some light bleed.

For that reason, room-darkening is a big issue in the shade fabrication world.  There are two sticking points with shades: one is the "pinholes of light" that are the consequence of stitching- the needle pierces the black inner layer of the lining and the tiny holes let light through.  The other issue is the "light bleed" from the sides of shades, whether inside or outside mounted.

For this project with Denise Wenacur, we wanted to make outside mounted room-darkening hobbled shades.  Hobbled shades eliminate the pinholes of light problem because the row stitching is hidden by the "hobbles".  The light bleed at the sides, however, is enhanced because the hobbles stand out from the vertical plane of the back of the shade, like this hobbled shade we made last summer:

We decided to make flat-back hobbled shades.  The flat back and the reverse mount allows the shade to hug the wall as closely as possible, minimizing the light gap.

When raised, the flat back folds up with the hobbles:

I hadn't made a flat-back functioning shade in a very long time, so I was feeling my way for this project.
I fused a coordinating lining to "Silky" blackout lining (from Angels Distributing) but in retrospect, next time I'd order a color-coordinated blackout lining and use it alone.  I marked the horizontal rows before taking it off the table to prepare the face.

For the face fabric, I made a mockup out of the cutoffs from the sides.  I was able to work with the pattern repeat so the hobbles are pleated to pattern.

Two different finished lengths required twice the planning!

I pinned the bottom so I wouldn't forget how the layers were sandwiched.

The two layers were first joined at the bottom, at the weight bar pocket.

Then the shade was laid on the table and the face fabric pinned to the flat back along the rows lightly marked with a pencil.

 I worked my way across, double-checking the lines on the flat back which I had marked earlier.

From the back:

And there, friends, is where the photos end!  Sewing these rows is JUST A LITTLE AWKWARD, which helps explain why I have no photos of that step.  After that, it was inevitable that I would forget to continue to document!  But the rest of the job was pretty basic.  

Rings were sewn to the back, and the shades strung (using Ring Locks) and rigged just as if it were a flat roman.  These were reverse mount, which means that the fabric comes off the back of the mounting surface- in this case, Rowley's EZ-Rig headrails with velcro, positioned as far back on the mount board as possible.  

Grommets in the shade allow the cords to come to the front and attach to the lift mechanism, and a blackout-lined topper blocks the grommet holes.

Pleating to pattern worked out beautifully- in this photo, see especially the bottom right which shows the pattern well:

There was another 128" wide x 27" long window for which we made a short hobbled shade that folded entirely up under the valance when raised.

This job was quite an adventure, and we were thrilled at how well it turned out!

Manipulating pattern on hobbled shades

Hobbled shades out of patterned fabric require careful planning.  When I was asked by Denise Wenacur to fabricate three more shades for this open space, I was glad I had documented my planning process for the first set!
The bay window shades provided continuity from the kitchen window around to the full-length family room windows, and really completed the flow of the space.

The new bay window shades

The original three shades in the family room

All the shades wrapping around the space from the sink to beyond the fireplace

I kept all my notes from the family room fabrication, but the best thing I did was photograph the fold layout. I was able to refer back to this and re-create the pattern placement exactly.

For this pattern, after crunching the numbers I decided I wanted to have every third fold match.The repeat is 17", so I multiplied by 2 which is 34 and divided by 3, which is 11.3".  I wanted 7" folds instead of 6".  

 Now, in order to fabricate a shade in compliance with the safety standards, we have a limit of 16.9" loop.  This means the ring spacing on the fabric plus the equal amount of lift cord cannot exceed 8.45"- and many of us just round that down and figure a maximum of 8" ring spacing.  But on a hobbled shade, there is another loop to consider: the loop created by the tape plus the row spacing.  For a 6" fold, that allows 6" between rings on the tape, and a little over 10.5" row spacing on the fabric.   That's what I usually figure for hobbled shades with no pattern.

However, for THIS shade, after adding the 7" tape/fold spacing to the 11.3" row spacing, the "loop" was 18.3"- more than is allowed.  So----- here is how I devised a way around that!

I marked the horizontal rows at 11.3", and the tapes at 7", and began sewing them onto the shade.  You can see here that I have used ribs, but not pockets.   An X-shaped stitch holds the layers together around the rib, the tape is secured, and the ring sewn to the tape.

X-stitch securing the rib

Securing the tape

Adding the ring

So here's my little trick.  Another stitch is made 3/4" down from the ring, by sliding the needle under the lining, coming up, and taking a tiny little tack to hold the tape down.  This effectively removes 1.5" from the loop- bringing the loop to under 16.9"!!!  This tack is still within the underneath of the fold area and therefore doesn't interfere with the folds as the shade is raised.

Sliding needle 3/4" down under lining only

Tacking the tape

The tack barely shows!

This is by far the fastest hobbled shade method I've devised yet, even with the extra step taken to accommodate the pattern to keep the shade in compliance with the standards.

Getting comfortable to work my way up the shade

Turban swags

Before I had the recent shade marathon, I had a swag sort of half-marathon.  The last proper blog post was the final installment of three about an arched swag treatment.  At the same time, I was drafting a pattern for Turban swags and also some Austrian swags.  So I had a big swag immersion week or two!
Of course the first thing I did for the Turban swags was drape chain weight, following the instructions in Ann Johnson's book.  The vertical chain drop marks the specific short point at the crossover.  Turban swags are hybrids: one side of each swag is a traditional board-mounted swag, and the other side is a boxed swag.  Ann shows how to combine two styles of swag to create this and other hybrid swags.

 Draping the chain weight took a lot of experimenting.  The board and legs were set up on the edge of the table so the chains could easily be adjusted to get the right silhouette.

The Turban swags presented a challenge because the fabric was a woven vertical stripe and the designer wanted the stripes to run horizontally.  Swag patterns are not rectangles- they are weird curved trapezoids- so the stripes would've been cut at an curve at the bottom and I didn't like how that looked.  Therefore I improvised.  The swag was possible by making a more informal look.  On the sides the stripes are pleated, but because the swag wasn't cut as it should've been, it wouldn't hold its folds.  I had to allow the fabric to do what it wanted, yet guide it into pleasing gathers.   The casual gathered look worked well with this heavy woven fabric.

These swags were being mounted on a window which ran straight into a door opening on the left, so the return couldn't be the full length of the swag on the left side.  I made a short return, then a fascia board to support it and provide a surface to wrap the bottom pleats around for stapling.

 A lot of stapling and unstapling and re-stapling went into the process of pleating the swag to achieve a pleasing look.  This is one of many incarnations of the return:

 Finally the swags were pleated attractively, and the returns were finished.  We added velcro and sent along a flap of fabric that the installer could position to conceal any gap, if that proved necessary.

I was on pins and needles until the phone rang- the designer and homeowner LOVED the treatment!