Eyelet Curtains For Easy Home Decor
In my home when I moved in I was confronted by a phalanx of venetian blinds in the many windows. I had never heard of eyelet curtains, and had in my mind the heavy prospect of replacing, or at least covering the rather unsightly blinds with draperies or curtains at great expense.
As luck would have it, one of my daughters was then enrolled in a home economics class. One day, as I gazed in despair at the unsatisfactory state of my window treatments, she asked me what was bothering me and I told her. With the enthusiasm of a high school sophomore, she brightly informed me that I need not despair. Eyelet curtains would be the answer to my problem.
She patiently explained to me (with all the smugness of a high school sophomore who had a leg up on the old man information-wise) that eyelet curtains are of a simpler and generally lighter construction than the sort of draperies we’d had in our house before the divorce or the armor plate looking draperies in Grandma’s house. They are made with eyelets (how about that?!) which are designed to be slid directly over a rod, or smaller eyelets, designed to accept hardware to hang on the rod, in the manner of a shower curtain.
Having looked ahead in her home economics syllabus, she knew that in a matter of a few weeks she would be designing and making eyelet kitchen curtains, and waxed enthusiastic about the prospect of providing me with such ‘discount’ curtains and bringing a smile to my face. I was delighted to commission her for the job, and a couple of weeks later, we were off to the fabric shop where she got to pick the material and some colorful plastic eyelets for her project.
Well, that story had a happy enough ending. She did a nice (B+) job on the curtains. However, she did not get the sewing bug, so the kitchen curtains were her only manifest contribution to the window covering project. In the end, I went shopping for discount curtains at a local department store. I found a wide selection of ready made curtains for every window in the house. I even bought some lined curtains for the upstairs rooms in hopes that the heavier weight would limit the amount of cold air coming in, which I think they have done. I have also discovered that the lined curtains are far more effective at blocking the intrusion of light from the outside. In those windows I have removed the venetian blinds altogether.
I even found lace curtains and silk curtains, although none of those have yet made their way into our house. Still, there was no shortage of colors or designs, and I was easily able to find curtains to complement our furniture and the wall and carpet colors in the house.
Whether you are someone who has at least some ability to do your own sewing or, like me, have to shop around, consider eyelet curtains as a low cost window treatment.