How to Hang Curtains Like a Designer

How you hang your curtains has more impact on the look of your space, than most people realized. If you walk into any new to you house, you’ll often see patched holes all around a window frame. Our natural inclination is to want to frame the window with our curtains. Curtains hung too low can actually make your window look smaller, your ceiling lower, and your overall space feel smaller.

This is one of the first design rules I learned as a young Army wife, and it’s such an easy fix with a huge impact! Once you hang your curtains this way, you’ll never go back. 

To fix this mistake, you’ll simply do the following:

First, you’ll want to add an extra 4-6 inches of rod on each side of the window.

Second, you’re going to hang your curtain above the window frame. The general rule of thumb is somewhere between halfway and two-thirds between the top of your window and the ceiling. Sometimes I will see curtains taken all the way to the ceiling, and this works well if you have windows that are already hung pretty high.

If you make these two simple changes when you hang your curtains, your windows will feel taller, your ceilings higher, and you will create the illusion of a larger room.

There are two more things to keep in mind when hanging your curtains.

1) Your curtains should touch the ground. You’ll want to have your curtains no more than 1/2″ above the floor. I prefer to have them barely touching the floor, but puddling on the floor is also okay.

2) Buy curtain panels that are 1.5 to 2x the width of the window you’re covering, and always use two or more panels per window. Often times I see one panel used on smaller windows, but you really want to add that second panel if space allows. This adds balance and symmetry to your window, and your room.

Happy decorating!!!