Posts tagged as:

pinch pleat

On my retro radar: A great pinch-pleat valance for a retro pink, yellow or blue green kitchen

by Pam Kueber on September 23, 2008

For anyone with a large single window in their 50s kitchen — and a pink, yellow or blue-green color scheme — this 72″ pinch pleat valance would be PERFECT.

Put it on a rod that wraps around your horizontal 2″ blinds, or stretches in front of them from cabinet-to-cabinet or cubby-to-cubby.

This valance is a real steal at $15!

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Six vintage pinch-pleat draperies – today’s ebay pick

by Pam Kueber on May 10, 2008

These pinch pleat draperies have a very pleasing design, sweet colors and nice scale – and there are six of them, a real plus. I will keep repeating: Pinch pleats — and Wallpaper. RR basics!

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Affordable pinch-pleat drapery sources from California Kathy

by Pam Kueber on May 1, 2008

I feel as strongly about pinch-pleat draperies as I do about wallpaper — you need these in your mid-century house, trust me. But, custom-made pinch-pleats can be wicked expensive. To the rescue: California Kathy with some great sounding recommendations.

Hi Pam,

I love checking in every day or so to see what great things you have to show us! Thanks so much for all the time and effort you put into this.

I saw you lust for pinch pleat sheers and this seller on eBay often has them. Here’s the link for what he has today. In case it doesn’t work, his online ID is hotelliquidator-67.

Also, I recently bought some ivory pinch pleat drapes from factorybargaindrapes.com. They have a “Hot Deals” page that has really good pricing. I love the ones I bought – seem to be very well made.

I took Kathy’s advice and checked the site out. I especially like some of the sheers – and what looks to be a wonderful ivory “Vegas Cream” opaque (above). I emailed Kathy — also asking for her retro renovation story — and she added:

Glad you like the sheers. If these particular ones don’t work for you I’d e-mail the guy as he has them often in several different sizes. The pinch pleats I got … are lined and are hand made. They came with the drapery hooks on them and on a hanger. I’m very happy with them. Especially since I found some I liked on their Hot Deal page and spent $100 for two windows! (The living room front window is a 5′ x 5′ picture window.)

I’m from northern California and live in a 1948 ranch. My favorites are the coved ceilings in the living room and a built in china cabinet in the kitchen. The kitchen also has scallop crown molding.

I’m not doing too much in the way of re-hab per se. I did just have a new formica counter put in the kitchen and I’m going to be installing a white subway tile backsplash soon. I’m going to add some 1″ glass tiles randomly as accents. The glass tilies are yellow, blue and red. Here’s the formica we used:

Thanks again for your blog! Kathy

Kathy – thank you!

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Embrace your Inner Traverse Rod — pinch pleat draperies are #1 for mid century homes

by Pam Kueber on November 6, 2007

I know that Pottery Barn and the like want you to buy those tabbed draperies, or the ones that simply slide onto decorative polls. But this is definitely not the right answer if you are in a mid century home! You need pinch pleat draperies, and that is that! In addition to looking so much better — in fact, I would go so far as to say that they are essential to a mid century interior — pinch pleats are insulating against both cold and heat…and, you can actually open and close them every day, with ease. My husband is a real stickler about the open-and-close part, and he is right! Nothing beats traverse rods for functionality.

It took me a long time to conquer my fear of traverse rods, but I endured – and triumphed! Now I have beautiful vintage draperies lining my living room walls and get this, they were only $20 Canadian (and when the CDN dollar wasn’t worth anything!) If you must make up your draperies new, you will have to work hard to find someone at a reasonable cost, the labor charge can be brutal. In terms of fabric, see my post on barkcloth from melinamade. There are definitely many other sources out there, I’ll look into it…

And, if you are really ambitious, consider pinch pleated sheers underneath heavier cloth pinch pleated draperies. I am going to do this someday, it is such a heavenly look – to have the sun filtering through sheers!

Some other tips:

Draperies that go all the way to the floor create a more formal look, a bigger statement. In the 50s you certainly saw drapes that only went to the sill or just below it. That’s fine, especially in bedrooms, but in living rooms and dining rooms, I think that to-the-floor…just brushing the floor, not puddling, is better.
As in the second photo – considering putting draperies along an entire wall. This creates a sense of greater space. You can also see how the softness of the light pink drapes creates a great counterpoint to the outrageousness of the wallpaper.
In addition to layering cloth with sheers, you can put horizontal Venetians underneath — see my post on 2″ aluminum blinds — as in the first photo. Layer!
When you’re planning, you need to plan for the ’stackback’ — look this up online.
Regarding how high to install draperies, this is an aesthetic decision. You want to balance the height of the perceived window (and the drapery becomes part of the window) with the rest of the room. In general, people make the mistake of installing the draperies too low, rather than too high.
Finally – I actually spray painted my Kirsch traverse rod to blend in with my grasscloth wallpaper. It turned out Great!

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