Save Money! Make Your Own Drapes!

      You may remember photos of my empty living room from past posts.  I posted about my carpet and new furniture, but my living room was very bright because I hadn't yet put up the drapes.  I loved the brightness in the daytime, but there was no privacy at night, so I began my hunt for drapes that would coordinate with my carpet and furniture.  
Tip # 1:  Carry your couch pillow with you in a bag to get the perfect color that you are looking for.
     That is what I did! And, guess what? Nothing that I could afford gave me the look that I wanted.  I was trying to avoid making my own drapes because of the time it would take me. But, when I had no luck, I went to the fabric store.  The store was having a 50% off sale on their decorator fabrics, and I found the perfect color! But, I figured I needed about 11 yards or so of fabric and even at $10 per yard, that was going to be over $110! So, I decided, to try to cut costs even more, I would go to SAS, our discount fabric warehouse and see if I could get lucky finding the same color that I had fallen in love with at the regular fabric store.  Jackpot! I found the same color drapery fabric in the clearance section of the SAS for $3.99 per yard!  Plus, one spool of the perfect match of thread.  After tax, the cost of my drapes came to just under $50! 

See how this nice, polished, drapery weight cotton's golden color goes well against my sofa?

      Tip #2:  Measure, measure, measure! Measure your windows before you shop and figure out how much fabric you will need, and add a little just to be safe.  I ended up getting 11 3/4 yards of fabric because I had to use two different bolts because one didn't have enough on it.  So, I didn't want a seam suddenly in the middle of my drapery panel, so I had to buy enough for 3 panels and then buy enough for the fourth panel from a different bolt.  Now that I am finished, I wish I had figured the panel length a little longer because in retrospect I would have made a deeper hem.  

I laid my measuring tape down on the floor and pinned it in place.

Then I laid the fabric out next to the tape to measure it.

I tore it across the grain for a straight edge.

       Tip #3:  Make french seams! No raveling allowed and you want the back of the panels to look as good as the front!  I have taught french seams before on my pillowcase post, but I will go over it again.

To start french seams, put the wrong sides of the fabric together.

This fabric had obvious wrong and right sides. The right side was polished and had a sheen to it.

Here is the right side that I started to sew on first. I was sewing a long center seam, adding two curtain panels together into one large panel so that I would have 2 panels on each side of my window instead of 4 separate panels.

Since there was a nice salvage edge, I used it as a guide and sewed down the middle of it for a straight 1/2 inch seam.

Then, I flipped the fabric so that the right sides were together and stitched the seam farther in, in this case 1 tick over from the 5/8 mark, to make sure that I captured the first 1/2 inch seam inside of it.

Can you see where I am using the guidelines to get a straight stitch?

     Tip #4:  Finish the edges of your panels very neatly, because they will show and be noticeable and no one wants to see puckering! I used my sewing machine's hem stitch to make a nice edge finish that looks great, if I do say so myself.

Once again, the salvage end is our friend. I used it to fold over the first part of the side hem. If you look at professional drapes, they usually have about a 1" or so wide side finished hem.

After stitching down the first part of the edge, fold it over again and then pull the under fabric back from the first crease in order to sew the hem stitch.

This is how the stitch looks. You sew along the hemmed creased edge and every so often, the needle will catch a bit of the fabric.

This is how it will look on the right side. Very neatly done!

     Tip #5: Decide how you want to hang your curtain in advance so that you will have measured for the correct amount of fabric and you will know what to measure for.  I decided to have a casing with a 2"piece above it that would shirr onto the rod. 

     So, I decided that I needed a 4" top hem.  My rod is 3/4 inches in diameter, so I made the casing just over an inch wide, plus I needed to sew under about 1/2 to finish the edge.  Here is the process;

Measure down and mark where you want the fabric to meet itself. For example, here I wanted a 1/2" finished edge, so I measured down 1", once I folded it, that would make 1/2". Then, When I wanted a 4" casing, I measured down 8".

I knew I was going to have a 2 1/4" top of my curtain, so I measured over from the needle and put a piece of tape as a stop to follow as I sewed.

I began sewing at the tip top of the curtain, I sewed down the top crease. Then I put the edge of the top against the tape and sewed the top of the casing. This kept my line very straight. Finally I stitched along the very bottom of the casing to finish it off.

      Remember that through all of these steps, your iron is your friend! Press down your seams, press down your hem lines.  This will help you end up with a beautiful finished look. 

       Tip #6:  Hang your drapes up to hem them to the right length.  I feel bad that I forgot to take pictures of my husband putting up my drapery rod.  He didn't even complain when I made him take out one end and put it up 3/16 of an inch higher because it didn't look even.  Our house is old and not everything is square anymore.  That is one reason why I felt I needed to hang the drapes to hem them.  If I had only measured, they would have surely looked crooked.

Sorry, I couldn't find a way to crop out my bare foot. I used the baseboard as a line to help me mark the hem. I wanted the drapes just above the floor.

The hem falls behind my couch. I love it!

     Once I finished the pinning, I took the drapes back down and sewed in a nice finished hem.  Then, I pressed the drapes and we hung them up!  I am so pleased with the results and with the cost!  Next, I am going to make tie-backs, but that will be a topic for another post!  
       Sewing your own drapes really isn't very difficult.  It is all straight stitching.  I think that the most difficult part is just the length and volume of fabric.  It took me 3 days (a few hours per day) to finish these.  I did one side each day for 2 days and then the hem on the third day.  It was time well spent for me! Now I have money left over to spend on other parts of my house.  Let me know if you think you will give this a try!