Wednesday, July 13, 2011

C's Window

C's room makeover is limping along.  She has the most gigantic window in her room.  Not only is the window huge, it has a huge transom window above it.  It's great that her room is so nice and bright, but it's not so great when I would like her to sleep a little later in the morning and she is getting woken up with the sun.

Here's her room before any making-over began.  Just keeping it real for you, with the mess and all:


Here's a less scary pic:


My solution was to cover the giant transom window with a pelmet, a.k.a. cornice or valance.  I was inspired by this window from Hi Sugarplum:



It looks so pretty and fancy....until you look at the back.



Basically all it is is foam board and duct tape. Simple, right?!?!?  Hi Sugarplum provides a great tutorial on how to make the pelmet, but I'll give you a few highlights.

Start with your foam board.  I got mine at Michael's for about $2.70/piece, but I just saw them at the dollar store for only $1.  I had to use 4 pieces and duct taped them all together.  To cut the board, just use a knife, score the board and then break it.



Here it is all laid out on my kitchen floor. This gives you an idea of what a beast this thing is:


Next, duct tape batting and fabric all over the thing.  Staples don't really work in the foam board, so duct tape is the best bet.  For fabric, I took some Pottery Barn curtains that K has had in her room FOREVER and just cut them up to fit.  I didn't want to spend a lot on fabric, because I was kind of dubious about how this project would turn out; and, because of its size, if it would even hang on the wall.

Here she is getting ready to be hung:

You can see a seam over on the right side where the fabric wasn't long enough and I had to add an extra piece.  To hide the seams, I just used fabric glue to glue on some white grosgrain ribbon.

Here it is covering the transom window.  It is so hard to take a picture of a window with the light streaming in!  Sorry for the dark photo.

Come back tomorrow and I promise you better pictures!  You will also be able to see the curtains that I made.  I know you're excited!

3 comments:

  1. Looks so good! Need to know two things - tute on the adorable monogram and how did you hang yours? I'm having some issues with hanging mine...as in it fell down after 5 minutes. Great job though - and so clever reusing the existing curtains.

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  2. I love this! I'm planning to make pelmets too. I posted your picture on my blog as it inspires me:

    http://typearamblings.blogspot.com/2011/08/blog-binge-drapes-and-valances-pelmet.html

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