I'm renovating a house in England and have got to the point where I need curtains(!)
Long story short: I never imaging buying curtains could be so much grief - no ready made websites I can find have parametric searching, ie "show me all the curtains that are of the following size".
Made-to-measure curtains seem amazingly expensive - it's against my religion to spend more than 100 pounds on a room's worth.
So I have considered making some myself (it's logical, I'm doing a lot of other work myself). I used to be pretty good with my Mum's old Singer sewing machine but that's a bit past it now.
So first question:
What is a good make of machine these days? I'm more interested in reliable smooth sewing than a computer that can do 2500 different stitches. In fact I regard the computer element as a liability - they usually die long before the mechanics give out.
Second question:
I've only turned up curtains before. If making lined pencil pleat ones, does one:
1) Hem the material and sew, hem the lining and sew then sew both together or2) Hem both with pins temporarily and sew the lot together in one operation (sounds fiddly)?
Third question
Does the lining go right to the top, ie under the pencil pleat tape?
Fourth question:
Assuming cotton, or a high % cotton mix, if I prewash the material first, would I expect that to cause most of the shrinkage the curtains will ever see? In other words, could I expect them not to shrink much further after that with occasional wet washing?
Sorry - lot of newbie questions...
Thanks anyway!
Cheers
Tim