Custom Drapery or Ready Made Drapery

Here is the question, custom drapery or ready made drapery? If you have never owned a custom drapery, you don’t know what you are missing. When my wife and I had our first child, we had metal mini blinds in our windows for privacy and then in our master bedroom, we had a valance that we bought from a reputable department store. Fast forward some 22 years later and everything in our house is custom. Sure, I am in the business and so it should be that I have custom throughout my home. But, it just makes a world of difference in how the home looks and feels. There are advantages and disadvantages to everything one compares. First, the ready made market is absolutely light years ahead of where it was 20 years ago. The fabrics are 100% times better as they are mostly imported if not all from Asia. These fabrics have a nice richness to them and many are even silk blend or poly/silk blend. If you are looking to just add a few panels to the ends of your windows and you have room to place your hardware, then this can be a good choice. Now you probably are wondering what the negatives are??? Well, there are plenty to match the positives. First, the “panel” you purchase might not be wide enough for your size window. If it isn’t, then your panel just looks so tiny and disproportionate. If so, then you can add panels together, but now they need to next to each other on the rod and thus an unfinished look can occur. Then there is the length. With ready made panels , you get one of about three to four different lengths. If you don’t have “play”, then your draperies may be too long or even short. A good well made drapery will be slightly off the floor or even slightly breaking and hence now we come to custom. I think the only “negative” of custom is that if your budget doesn’t allow for it and you have very little expendable money, then it doesn’t make sense. With custom, you pay for what you get. Those mini blinds in our first house are long gone as were on our third house. Our windows in the living and dining room have Hunter Douglas silhouette shades. These are exquisite sheer fabrics made into a privacy shade. To go over these, we have a decorative wood pole and on each side is a well proportioned set of panels that hang beautifully. They are hand sewn with attention to detail in the bottom and side hem. The rest of the house has roman shades, wood blinds, cellular shades, a custom bedspread with custom pillows and more. So when I go home at night, I read or watch television with “furniture” on my windows.