Hey everyone, I’ve moved house and am currently decorating the guest bedroom. One of the windows is really awkward - it’s got a pointed top (gable), is only 130 cm wide x 170cm deep, and the left sloping side follows the sloping ceiling. So I can’t just hang a blind above the frame to cover the gable top. As it’s a guest bedroom, I need to provide some way of drawing a blind or curtain over this for both privacy and light leakage at night, but I’ll be damned if I know how to do it, short of taping newspaper over the window. Any suggestions?
Can you sew?
A spring loaded curtain rod can hold a heavy-ish piece of fabric at an angle at the top inside the casing. The hem needs to be cut at an angle and hemmed.
Or a custom blind place. They are expensive though.
Yes, I’ve gone google mad looking for custom blinds, and they all seem to be very fancy electric contraptions which I’m not doing for a small spare room. I can’t not sew, but no longer have a machine, and honesty can’t really be bothered.
You could hem with the stitch-fix tape. It’s iron on. Very easy to use. Just follow instructions.
Or a custom cut shutter?
I can sew, but choose not to. Instead, I use a local dry cleaner who does alterations, etc. I buy fabric, take pictures, and make a sketch of what I need and she does the rest.
My gf also goes there. The woman is Korean and always tells my gf, “your husband very handsome” and she tells me, “your wife so pretty!”.
I swear @kayaker you amaze me. You got a nice story about everything.
Custom sewing/alterations can be found. It’s expensive.
I find I could make a small living just hemming jeans for people. Why do they not buy jeans the right length?
Or if their inseam is odd, as needs must, learn to hem. It’s very easy.
I wonder if I could fashion a wooden frame in the shape of the window and put some nice fabric inside it. Attach to window with a hinge? I mean, it sounds like an awful lot of trouble, but probably several £100s cheaper than a customer shutter - which would be lovely, but probably in the ‘not worth the money’ bucket.
Maybe Ms Kim cuts me a break since my gf takes her dry cleaning to her. My dry cleaning goes in with my regular laundry. Sometimes it is destroyed, but often it works out fine.
Any chance of a picture? Having trouble visualizing.
Here you go. Excuse grubby window frame - decorating this weekend!
Hang a normal blind from the straight part down and just build a valance for the peak.
Talk me through the valance bit… is that just a bit of material hung to cover the peak? How does it attach? Assume I know nothing (not a crafter).
Basically, you build a wood triangular frame to fit the top part of the window, cover it with light-proof fabric, and fasten it permanently to cover the triangle at the top of the window. It could go inside the window frame (probably the nicest look) or cover the window frame. If you don’t have tools or know-how to make such a frame or to attach it, I would look for a local handyman type person. It shouldn’t cost a huge amount.
I would go with a cornice box. You simply build a frame out of 1X4 lumber, cover that with plywood, go to an upholstery shop and get a little padding and then cover it with the fabric of your choice using a staple gun. I would run the cornice box down at least 4" from the top of the blind,
How about 2 drapes hanging from the top angles, attached at the peak of the triangle on top and just pulled to the sides to open? They would be held open with a loop of fabric around the drapes about halfway down the sides of the window and then to a hook on the side of the window. There must be some term for this type of drape that I don’t know. This is just like many drapes that can slide open on a rod and are held on the sides, except the top can’t be opened all that much. Somebody familiar with drapery maybe understands what I’m trying to say.
ETA: Look at this picture and imagine the tops of the two drapes meet in the middle at the peak of the window. They seem to be meeting now at the top of an ordinary window with a horizontal top. I think this would be far easier to accomplish than other methods, although a valence or just a stained glass film over the triangular part would allow hanging ordinary drapes and curtains (whatever the difference between the two is).
Small pair of (black-out) curtains — hopefully the ones with grommets on the top edge; each panel as wide as half the window. Secure a hook in the frame at the top of the triangle and hang both panels. Another hook at the top of each vertical piece of the side frames. Get a couple clips like you would use for a chip bag (but not those, specifically, we’re running a class operation, here), clamp to the side of the curtain where the hooks are and hang the clips from the hooks. The triangles of curtain that hang down from the top can be folded behind the curtains.
Ninjad by TriPolar, for the love of Frith.
Those two sound great but the bottom will be uneven. It could be a look, I suppose.
I like @SanVito s frame covered with fabric. Are you good with light weight lumber and fasteners? Gonna need a good staple gun.
Down and dirty??
You could glue a nice fabric over a cut-to-fit piece of Reflectix.
If the Reflectix won’t “press fit” adequately into the window space, you could glue a couple of rare earth magnets around the perimeter of the Reflectix (and – if the window’s frame isn’t ferrous, a couple more rare earth magnets to the frame – or a Velcro configuration, similarly arranged) and have something somewhat decorative, good for privacy, basically totally room-darkening, and – if it matters to you – with a bit of extra insulation.
This seems to be the difference between curtains and drapes:
Either could be used with this window, but curtains would leave the space under the window available for a table or something.
Foam core board would work like that. But cheaper.