Oversize panels

Until this project, I had never made panels longer than my 12' table.
When my designer friend Liz began furnishing her Florida home, she asked me to fabricate her 14' long draperies in my NY workroom and ship them to her.

We first mocked up the pleats to determine the pattern layout.  This fabric lent itself beautifully to inverted pleat.

The embroidery was irregular, so I worried a little about the geometric shapes not aligning perfectly, but at a height of 168" the small variation is totally not noticeable!

 The family room panels are pleated to pattern with a two-finger pinch pleat and 5" buckram.

Most of the panels in this home were 1.5 widths, but this corner required a 3-width panel.

I've made plenty of oversize shades, so that experience was helpful in managing the fabric volume.  It also helped to have taken Ann Johnson's excellent "Super-Size Me!" class on how to handle all kinds of oversize treatments.
First I worked the bottom 12' of the panel, shifting my way across the 3 widths, making sure to baste a precise horizontal line so I'd have an accurate reference line for shifting to the top.  (You know I love to baste!)  Once the bottoms 12' of the 3 widths were finished, I shifted the fabric to fall off the end of the table, and worked back across the 3 widths to complete the tops.

This entire project was intense!  I was working so hard, I did not take a single photograph during the fabrication, which I now regret.  Next time.  Ha. 
The master bedroom panels are a mere 126" long, by comparison a breeze.  I don't have good photos of this room yet so I'll just show the pretty pleats.

The embroidery made the pleat tops flare out too much, so I secured them at the back to control them and make them uniform.

My next oversize project is going to be a hobbled shade 158" wide and 75" long.  Always an adventure!

Pinch pleat valances

Last week I delivered 3 separate orders for simple pinch pleated valances.  The fanciest they got was matching covered buttons.  This fabric was railroaded, so the striated weave runs vertically.

For this valance, I didn't need to cut the sections and pleats separately; the width of the sections and the horizontal repeat worked out so I could simply join the widths.  The pleat had slightly more fabric in it than usual, about 10",  so I made a four-finger pleat.

One simple step turns a utilitarian pleat into a decorative pleat: instead of tacking through the pleat by machine, I like to hand-tack over the pleat, so the thread is visible.  I use fusible 4" buckram from Rowley Company for valances like this: it folds well and holds its shape without crumpling, and keeps the top line straight.

I also like a four-finger pleat when covered buttons are being added; the center fold is a good nestling spot for the button shank.  There is about 9" in these pleats.

There were three or four of these little shorties, for a kitchen, all different widths.  The buckram was split to create a dainty 2" pleat on these 10" long valances.  The sections and pleats were cut separately and joined, so the pattern matches from one to the next- standard operating procedure for me and my fellow workroom colleagues.  This step might be unavailable, or upcharged, from a factory workroom.

I thought a 4-finger pleat would look out of proportions on these short pleats.  There's about 7.5" in each pleat section- still generous for a three-finger pleat.

Some workrooms line all valances with blackout; some also interline everything.  Since I work to the trade, I lined these with plain lining as per the designer's specifications.
For those of you who have read this far, I will add an explanation of why I have not posted every day as I had hoped: an event occurred in our family and my attention was necessarily focused there.  But I'm back!

Some recent projects

I have been so remiss lately, totally forgetting to document our daily fabrication adventures!  Partly because we're busy, and partly because I some projects can't be photographed, and partly because I just forget.
So here are some post-installation photos of some recent projects.

Denise Wenacur turned this window seat into a colorful and tasteful space that a young girl can grow into.  Is glazed cotton making a resurgence?  Both of these prints were somewhat glazed, especially the cushion fabric.  It was a delight to sew, and the geometric design made it super easy to match the pattern on the boxing to the main body.

I opted to alternate motifs on the valance.  The valance is 18" long, and to have the sections all literally match just seemed too much.

In the guest room, I got to reprise the hybrid soft cornice with kick pleats that I had so much fun making earlier in the year.  You can't tell from the photo, but the light color diamond pattern is a fairly heavy chenille, so there was a bit of a challenge keeping the bulk off of the board at the ends. 

Here is the same style we made back in March.  I posted a how-to at the time, here.  We made these new ones the same way, on buckram with interlining, minus the trim and lip cord.

The room is not quite finished, but the window treatments will be an important component.

Let's see, what else?  For Suzie of Cottages to Castles: blackout draperies, 4 widths each side, out of a horizontal striped faux silk?  I did have help fabricating these- that's quite a handful of fabric!  We used double-wide "Silky" blackout so there would be no seams with light leakage.  These curtains are installed on a motorized rod.

And how about this room for D. S. Interiors, full of inverted pleat, mock wave curtains?  Every single space had a slightly different finished length, so we pattern matched from the top down, using 4" fusible transparent Dofix buckram.  What a breeze that product made the project!  The tucks were pleated to pattern so the geometric motif is the same on every "wave."  The bottom hems were barely 1" so there would be a minimum of embroidery showing through the double fold.  White chain weight helps the fabric stay put.  The measurements were so unequal, sometimes even on one single window, so we mostly split the difference to keep the bottom line of the curtain as much the same as possible.

 

Well, that's all for today, folks!  More next time........

Portiere pinch pleat panel

An open doorway needed a two-sided pinch-pleated drapery panel on an inside-mounted track with glides.

After much trial and error, I devised a way to sew glides in between the two drapery layers, so the fabric could be pleated outward on both sides.

To make the panels, I sewed right sides together - - - by hand with a ladder stitch.  I did not trust my machine-sewing skills enough to get these edges matched perfectly.  The layers are interlined with thermal lining.

At the bottom, I slipped in drapery weights.....

And closed the bottom with a few inches of stitching.

At the top, one layer has buckram folded into the header, and the other layer has the thermal lining folded into the header.

I pressed them down and basted about 10" down so the layers would not shift when I transferred the fabric to the sewing machine to create the pleat back-stitching.

Each side is pleated separately, to pattern of course!- and the sewn-in glides join the layers.

Happy New Year, Blog!!!

Hey!  This blog is now 6 years old!
For my first post of the new year, here is a project for Paris Interiors in Scarsdale NY that included something of everything: a relaxed shade, a soft cornice, a 14' hard cornice, interlined pinch pleats with exquisite trim, and 14' of sheers.

The shade and soft cornice were in adjoining rooms, made from the same fabric- a taupe Scottish lace from Noblis-  but treated very differently.

In the living room, a luxurious ombre silk from Romo became stationary  pinch pleat panels mounted over a cornice, with grey traversing sheers under.

The shade is flat, with the rings set in 10" to create generous tails.  The bottom is trimmed with layered tape and glass beads from Samuel and Sons.  In case you wonder about the proportions, the width is about 65".  The lace is lined with a plain winter white voile.

I'm falling in love again with soft cornices.

This one was made on two layers of buckram.  Here the fabric is laid out over the paper pattern and photographed for the designer's approval.

Napped lining in khaki was layered under the lace, and a tiny lip cord finished the bottom edge.  All of this was hand-sewn, not glued.  It's not that I'm anti-adhesive, it's just that I like the results of sewing better with this little lip cord, plus sewing is more fun.

The top was finished with a 1/4" braid lip cord.

I wasn't sure if the treatment would need legs, but it did.  We didn't want the treatment to extend much beyond the molding, so I made the legs out of 1/4" hardwood from Home Depot.

The breathtaking trim for the LR panels came from Zimmer-Rohde.  It is applied by Dofix.  The pinch pleats are tacked by hand, with the thread looping around the front of the pleats.  Unfortunately it was totally impossible to pleat this to pattern, but I think it is fine anyhow!

 The sheers were also entirely sewn by hand.  I LOVE sewing sheers.

It was important to keep the face of the cornice untouched in case the client ever wants to use it without the panels.  I slipped pin strip from Rowley under the loosened top welt.  It was a little tricky hooking the drapery pins into the little holes, but Mario managed to do so, gracefully.

Little screw eyes provided a spot to hang the returns.

It took awhile to dress this silk, but Mario excels at that.  I let out the lead edge hem on one side and re-stitched on-site, to let it down a little- it didn't want to reach the floor without some coaxing.

I learned a lot from this installation.  That's why it's important for workrooms to get out there when their products are being installed.  Seeing the challenges and devising solutions informs protocol for the next time around with the same treatment.

What we did for the past two weeks.....

It is so much fun to watch an empty house being transformed into a home.  With her distinctive style, Denise Wenacur applies color and texture to a room's elements, creating a cohesive whole, like a painting.
Although not fully furnished yet, our recent window treatment installations have set this renovated house well on its way to looking like a home.

Living Room Before

In the living room, blending textures and tones, a smooth grey roman shade is flanked by slubby linen grommeted panels on brushed nickel poles.

These panels were two full widths per side.  Eight #12 grommets were used per width on 1" poles, and the each panel stacks down to about a foot wide.
On an adjacent wall, we used single width panels on a window half this size with no room for stackback.
 
Thanks to various webinars from CHF Academy, Rowley Company, and other sources, I think maybe I've finally gotten my grommet knowledge internalized.
The most important tip I that I learned that I can pass on is: make a template out of buckram.  Actually cut the holes and thread them onto a pole.  That's how you can be really sure that you're planning correctly and that the seam isn't going to come out facing forward.  The other most important piece of information is that you always must have an even number of grommets.

In the dining room, the embroidered floral kick pleat valance with side panels warms up the space, while the gold textured solid relaxed shade offers privacy.

Viewed here from the second floor landing, the family room is warm and inviting, with new furniture, shades, and cornices. 

Here's the family room before.





To maximize the potential light in the sunroom, the homeowners keep the shades up as high as possible.  But for viewing TV, the shades are lowered, and the double-sided blackout lining method eliminates the pesky "pinholes of light" that we workrooms dread.

From outside, the lining folds up neatly.  All of these downstairs windows had a generous 3" of mounting space inside, which made it feasible to do the double-sided shades.  It also gave enough room to use the larger Rollease clutch which operates SO smoothly. 

The kitchen sink window is dressed with a kick pleat valance out of the same textured gold as in the dining room.

The large master bedroom window is quite tall at 110".  The homeowners need light control.  A blackout shade would have been unmanageably massive and heavy, so  Denise offered blackout draperies with a light-diffusing sheer behind, on a double track with glides, operated with sturdy 5' metal batons in a matching finish.

The smaller window on the adjacent wall had too little room for draperies, so Denise chose a flat Roman shade.  We made this with our latest new method for eliminating pinholes of light, which involves two layers of blackout lining.  More on that another time.

Not photographed: a small shade for the back door, another for an upstairs bathroom, and sheer stretch panels for the front hall sidelights.
A big thank you to my fantastic installer Mario Fuentes...........
And that's what we've been doing for the past two weeks!