Styles

DNDY design

Drapery

DNDY design specializes in making custom window treatments from elegant formal draperies to casual and stylish. The choices are endless yet there are a few rules that apply to most treatments. Here are some pointers to help you make the right choices for you.

For ready made drapery and fabric choices click here.

Draperies or Curtains Curtains or Draperies?

Draperies are fabric panels that hang from above the window to the floor, sometimes even hitting the floor in a puddle of fabric. Curtains hang from above the window to just below the window sill and can also be set inside a windows casing. Cafe Curtains start midway on the window to the sill or below. Valances do a great job to frame or top a window and extend its height. When it's upholstered on a form, it becomes a Cornice.

Valances, Draperies and Curtains can be lined or unlined. Unless it is a sheer fabric and intended to see though. The DNDY workroom lines everything. Lining provides a fullness to your fabric, helps it hang nicely and most important protects your investment from the sun. As a benefit it can also provide sound, light and thermal insulation.
Draperies and curtains are constructed in panel widths of fabric to achieve the desired fullness for you design. Most fabrics are 54" wide and are pleated down to desired fullness. Pleats??? Why Pleats? Drapery pleats are there so when you close your drape its fullness will follow and be dispersed evenly. With a flat panel drape with no pleats the fullness must be evened out manually. Pleats come in many styles. To name a few: The Box pleat this pleat can be reversed or set forward, The Pinch pleat, The Goblet pleat or Cartridge Pleat. Each pleat emulates a different style...my favorite is a Reverse Box pleat. Yet there are still so many ways to finish the tops of your drapery not to mention your hems. The DNDY workroom always puts double 4" fold hems on all drapery as deep hems make them hang nicer. The formula to the right will show you how to calculate your yardage needs.

If you have any questions about any drapery style or want to know what would work best for you, please ask. We believe by understanding what you want and being informed, you make better choices.

Call DNDY design today.

Box Pleat

Goblet Pleat

Pinch Pleat

Cartridge Pleat

How Much Fabric Do I Need????

Figuring how much yardage you need, first requires you to know how wide your drape will hang, how long, and how full you want them. You need to account for pattern repeats and hemming allowance, (our work room requests 18” hem allowance per panel). How wide, is generally the width of your drapery rod. Most drapes extend beyond the width of the window allowing your stack space not to block your outside views and light. Once you know how wide and how long and how full just fill in the blanks to determine our yardage. For our example our Rod is 84” we want double fullness and a finish length of 90”.

Step 1. Collect all your information

Rod length.........84

Fabric fullness......2

Finish length.......86

Hem allowance....18

Width of fabric.....54

Pattern repeat.....27

Step 2. Calculate the number of panels needed

Rod Length..................84

Multiply by fullness.......x 2

Total Width ............... 168

Divide by fabric width… /54

Result..................... 3.11

Round up to nearest whole number. It is ok to round down if under .25 in some cases with light fabrics I will round up to nearest whole even number. For our example we will round down to 3 panel cuts of fabric.

Step 3. Calculate rough cut panel lengths.

Finish length..........86

Hem allowance.......18

Equals cut length...104

This is the length each cut of fabric needs to be if you have no pattern repeat head to the next step. If you have a repeat, keep going.

Cut Length................... 104

Divide by repeat........... / 27

Result..........................3.85

Round up......................... 4

Multiply by repeat............ 27

Result is length of each panel.. 108

Step 4. Calculating the yardage.

Enter cuts from step 2 ...................3

Enter length from step 3.............108

Multiply cuts by length................324

Divide by .................................. 36

Total yards needed ..................... 9

Click for Drapery Pictures