Nursery Reveal Part 5 – Window Treatments

Before I started Suite Pieces six years ago, I worked as a design consultant at Calico Corners. It was right after I quit my job in corporate America to try to give a go to this design thing. I had actually went back to school before my corporate career ended to study Interior Design. That’s what I thought I wanted to do, be an interior designer.

So, I landed a job at Calico (literally 1 day after I quit…God will provide the steps if you truly follow what’s in your heart!) and I also worked for an interior designer as an assistant. I learned so much with those 2 jobs in about a year’s time. At Calico, I learned all about fabrics & custom work. Window treatments, custom bedding, custom pillows, upholstery, slipcovers, blinds, you name it…I loved going to work every day and playing with fabrics, helping customers choose combos that would enhance their space or make it new & fresh.

I also loved working for the interior designer…she was very high end and had some pretty spectacular clients. She basically designed everything from scratch…meaning that we didn’t buy a sofa, she drew it out and had it made for the client. Same thing for stair railings, tile layouts, you name it. It was a pretty suite education in the world of custom. Here’s a couple shots of a Holiday Showhouse we did just before I opened the business.

What I learned along that journey was that although I loved interior design, I didn’t want to just be an interior designer. I knew I had a love for DIY and also for teaching. I actually originally went to school to be a math teacher…after a year of teaching high school math, I knew it wasn’t where I was supposed to be.

I tried to figure out how to combine my love for interior design with high end budgets and my love for DIY, teaching and not so big budgets. That’s really how our store was born.

We do design some pretty fabulous stuff here, between our furniture & upholstered pieces, but we also really really really LOVE teaching you how to do it! We recognize that we serve both the customer who will never open a can of paint and those who can’t wait to get their hands on a paint brush. Walk into any high end design/furniture showroom and ask them how they achieved their finish, or if you can purchase a raw frame to paint & upholster it yourself…see how fast they laugh at you…lol.

 

So, this part of the nursery reveal is a bit about taking what I learned when I was working in the interior design field. If you’re not afraid of using a jigsaw & a staple gun, you could create the cornice yourself and sub in some ready made drapes & a shade to create the same look. Or, you can call Elisa and be amazed by her reasonable prices on custom work…wink wink. Tell her Amanda sent you ; )

 

All my window treatments have been created by Elisa, our manager in the Massapequa store also famously known as The Drapery Lady. Elisa is super talented and can basically create anything when it comes to window treatments, slip covers, upholstery, or pretty much anything with fabric. Elisa also has a love for providing attainable custom design to clients with not so huge budgets.

My window treatment consists of 3 elements. A cornice box, a fabric shade & 2 drapery panels. The reason I chose to make it a bit extravagant, is 2 fold…first, if you haven’t noticed, I’m kind of an over the top kind of girl…I love bling & sparkly things. Second, I wanted to make sure that Madison’s room would be pitch black when she’s sleeping, because from what I had heard, babies sleep better when there’s no light leak in the room. Without a cornice box, light can leak above the window. And without the panels, the light will leak out either side. I like when my baby sleeps well…and the darkness for sure helps!

I tried quite a few different combinations when it came to the fabrics.

Once I found these 3 fabrics, I was completely satisfied! I absolute love polka dots & stripes & detail. The mix of textures & patterns is perfect. Dots & stripes, florals & geometrics and plaids & big patterns are some other great combos. The embroidered dot on the shade adds an element of texture and combined with the pink silk on the drapes it’s a nice balance between formal & fun. The micro stripe on the cornice was perfect to tie in to the other two.

I added a grey cotton stripe on the silk drapes, again, to balance the formal & fun. It takes it down a notch from being so prim & proper. The beaded gold trim on the cornice was added with a little hot glue, although it looks like a nailhead trim, it came on a roll and it was super easy to apply.

The cornice design was something I dreamt up, I saw it clear as day in my head one morning and quickly jotted it down on paper. I had to do some work to figure out the right proportions with the monogram “M” in the center of it. Proportions & scale are super important in design. If you don’t get it right, it can look really bad.

We offer the wooden monograms for custom order. Give us a call at the shop if you’d like one. We can make them in pretty much any size and you can paint them in any color you’d like!

I used our gold metallic paint on the raw wood and I made a mix of Pharaoh’s Gold & Pale Gold from our Modern Masters line. I just tacked on the monogram with little finishing nails.

I found these tie backs in our vintage hardware bin. Again, something I envisioned in the middle of the night…lol. I stayed awake almost all night wondering if someone had already purchased them. Have you visited our vintage hardware bin?? We just moved it downstairs into our “Nude Furniture” area. The perfect space to find some projects to take home! Stop by our Huntington store to check it out.

An important element of custom window treatments is the lining. Lining gives your drapes body, it makes them look full. We used blackout lining on the shade. Once the shade is down, the room is pitch black. On the silk drapes, we used interlining & regular lining. Interlining is good for silk because it helps protect it’s delicate nature from the sunlight and also gives them heft and body to weigh down the light silk. Interlining is like a flannel material. You can tell the quality of drapes if you flip them around and look at the lining. Many ready made drapes don’t have lining at all, others it’s very thin or not stitched as nicely. See how nice Elisa’s drapes look??

So are you dreaming of custom drapes for your home? Well look no further…stop by one of our shops and browse our selection of fabrics or bring your own. Then make an appointment to chat with Elisa either in our Huntington or Massapequa store and she’ll work with you to create something suite for your home.

Until next week peeps, when I talk about how to custom mix colors to match your space. Chat soon!