floral curtains interior design
hello i'm angela broughton from polesandblinds.com i have decided to break my curtain making videos into 3 sections. part 1 and 2 are about how to make the basic curtains the other videos will about making the various headings such as pinch pleat or pencil pleat, eyelets or any of the other types of headings. i have made the curtains a very small sample size otherwise it takes too long making them for the purpose of the video. measure your finished curtain length across
the whole width. pin in place take your heading tape and pull the strings out from one end. tie a knot securely and trim of the surplus tape. you will have a left hand curtain and a right hand curtain so make sure the knotted end of the tape is always to the centre of the curtains so the knot can be sewn into the tape
so it will not notice on the leading edge of the curtains. mitre the corner with just a simple fold so you have a neat edge to take the tape to. fold under and pin the tape to the edge of the curtain but drop down half an inch from the top. it's always a good idea if you can to start the tape
where there is going to be a hook because if you have it midway you will have a flat section of curtain showing that isn't gathered. pop a pin in keeping the tape at 90 degrees to the hem line. just a quick tip that i have learnt over the years - always make sure that you have the hook pocket on the front side of the tape or you will end up having sewn all the way across
to find you have the position for the hook sewn to the face of the curtains then you will have to undo them and start again. you need to have a double row of pins keeping the bulk of the curtain to the left side so you only have a small section by the machine head. mitre the other corner in and pull the strings free and pin. machine the heading tape on, holding it firmly going slowly over the pins.
sew both rows and then sew down the sides of the tape making sure the knot is sewn into the tape on the leading edge and the pull cord end with the strings free on the outer edge. machine down to neaten off. generally you need about 4 spaces between each hook so that will be about 9 hooks to the width. i am going
to show you a couple of alternatives to just having a normal pencil pleat. one type is just a puffy top that stands up above the top of the tape. first cut a strip of fabric, you often have bits left over from when you cut off the pattern repeats. make it the length of the curtain heading plus a bit for the seams. sew up each end on the wrong side of the fabric strip. with this particular puffy top
to achieve the maximum amount of puff do not press the strip in half along the fold or you will end up with a solid crease line running through the puff. trim off the corners and turn through each end of the strip and then pop it into the top of the pencil pleat heading and pin along making sure you have both seams together. use a good number of pins to save it from slipping or puckering. machine along
the top row of stitching making sure the bottom edge of the pencil pleat tape is also well fixed otherwise it will slip and you will have slanting pencil pleats that are not sitting evenly so here you can see the little upstand sewn into the top of the pencil pleat tape and the second row of stitching finished on the tape. trim off the cottons
and then pull up your pencil pleat tape here you have your pencil pleat heading with the upstand. its worth a mention that if you are unsure how to do the gathers to make sure they are evenly spaced, if you pop a pin at the midway point between each individual width of curtain, then you roughly be able to see that you have the centre in the centre. turn the curtain over and just puff this up over
the top of the heading tape so it just gives an interesting little effect. this is quite a fun treatment for children's bedrooms for instance if you pick out the puffy top in a bright contrasting colour or in a kitchen where you might have a plain fabric, you could do the contrasting top in an alternative colour. so there you have a pencil pleat heading with a contrasting narrow puffy top.