Many years ago when I was newly married, living in Hawaii and poor (they do go hand in hand
in most cases) I needed a bathroom window curtain. Even the 'cheap' curtains
were more than I wanted to spend. My husband was in the Navy and money for
curtains wasn't in the budget. Hawaii was and is an expensive place to live.
One day I received a surprise
package from home that contained a beautiful set of towels. I knew I would
probably seldom use them as they were too pretty.
The person who sent me the towels asked how I liked them. I told a white lie
and said they were perfect. They were perfect, inside the closet where they
sat, they were perfect.
One day when I really could not
stand the naked bathroom window any longer I took out the pretty towels. I had
a brainstorm. I don't sew, I can't sew well enough to make button stay on. The
only way I knew to turn a towel into a bathroom curtain meant I had to sew. I
thought that if I sewed it by hand and took my time that it would turn out OK.
That was my plan until I told my neighbor my brainstorm and she said she could
borrow a sewing machine and would be glad to sew
for me.
The bathroom window was small and I
didn't want to cut the towels. I didn't care how long the curtains were as long
as they did their job. So instead of trying to make the curtains fit the window
we just improvised and let them hang much lower than the actual window. Since a
towel has finished edges on all four sides all we did was fold the top toward the
back of the curtain about 2 inches and she sewed it down, which created a
pocket for the rod to slip through. There was already a very basic curtain rod
at the window. All I had to do was slide the curtains onto the rod and bingo -
almost instant curtains.
We were quite pleased with the
finished product. When my husband came home I went into great detail about the
design of the new bathroom window curtain. Then I showed him the towel window
curtain and he thought it looked very good. My neighbor was so pleased that
she made bathroom curtains out of towels for herself.
There are several good reasons to
make bathroom curtains out of towels. They come in a large variety of colors,
patterns, sizes and prices. They require very little sewing to turn towels into
curtains. They are easy to wash, no ironing or special care is required. When
you get tired of them as curtains you can take out the stitches and turn them
back into towels.
It's simple to make towel curtains:
- Measure the height and width of your window
- Determine what size towels you need
- Check your linen closet for the perfect towels
- Fold over the top of the towel about 2 inches
- Stitch the fold down
- Hang the curtains
- Admire your work!
If you really don't want to sew you
can buy the ring clips. Just clip the rings onto the top of the towels and hang
that way, no sewing required at all. You can hang them on a café style rod or
other decorative rod since the rod will show.
Towel curtains would work well in a
laundry room, or even a child's room. Kitchen window curtains or just valences
could be made from fancy dish towels. Towel curtains would be very appropriate
for a beach house. You could use beach towels for a longer look. Beach towels
have such bright bold colors they can do a lot to dress up your space.
If you need window curtains, use
your imagination and some towels and you will wind up with designer curtains at
budget prices!
Photos belong to AbbyG
