Soft treatments · The finishing layer
Drapery, the thing that finishes a room
Shades control light. Drapery makes the room feel finished. Most rooms that look almost right are missing this layer rather than a different blind.
Why drapery
Softness, height and sound.
Drapery does three things a shade cannot. It softens the hard vertical line where wall meets window. It makes the window — and therefore the ceiling — read taller, if it is hung properly, which means high and wide rather than tight to the frame. And it absorbs sound, which in a large room with hard floors is the difference between comfortable and echoing.
Most of our drapery goes in alongside a shade rather than instead of one. The shade does the work; the drapery does the room. If you have shades you are happy with and the room still feels unfinished, this is almost certainly the missing layer.
Getting it right
Hung high, hung wide.
The most common mistake in drapery is a rod exactly as wide as the window, mounted just above it.
- HeightMount the rod near the ceiling rather than at the top of the frame. The eye reads the whole height as window. It costs nothing and it is the single biggest improvement available.
- WidthExtend the rod well past the frame so the panels stack against wall rather than glass when open. You keep all your daylight and the window looks considerably wider.
- Fullness & lengthPanels should be generous enough to still look gathered when closed, and should reach the floor — just kissing it, or breaking slightly. Short curtains are the fastest way to make an expensive fabric look cheap.
- HardwareWe carry Paris Texas Hardware. On a functional drapery that gets drawn every night, the rod and rings matter as much as the cloth, and cheap hardware announces itself every single time you use it.
Pairs well with
What goes underneath.
Drapery usually layers over one of these.
Questions
Asked and answered.
Do I need drapery if I already have shades?
Need, no. But if a room feels unfinished despite everything in it being nice, this is usually what is missing. Drapery is the layer that softens and frames; a shade on its own leaves a hard rectangle in the wall.
Should drapery be functional or decorative?
Decorative panels that never close cost less and are perfectly legitimate — they frame the window and the shade does the work. Functional drapery that draws every night needs more fabric, better hardware and a heavier lining. Tell us which you want and we will price honestly for it.
What fabrics do you carry?
Principally Carole Fabrics, which is a deep book, and we can work from a swatch you already have. We bring the books to your house because fabric colour under showroom lighting is close to meaningless.
Free & no-obligation
Roll credits on bare windows.
Tell us a little about your project and we'll call to set up your free in-home consultation — usually within one business day. Prefer to talk now? Call (610) 883-9063.
- Up to 30% off current promotions applied to your quote
- Professional measuring included
- Lifetime service warranty on every install
Windows still bare? The consultation is free and the coffee's on you.