DIY: sunlight curtain

i have lived in my house for over a year and a half…and until about a week ago i didn’t have a curtain for my bathroom. the space was often covered up by a piece of fabric … or a towel. ha! how horrible. i just couldn’t find a curtain i was okay with and i always wanted to try and make something. i just kept procrastinating and procrastinating…and finally more procrastinating. every time i went into the bathroom, it drove me nuts, but yet i continued to let it sit on my list of things to do, always putting other tasks first, like making cupcakes.

a few months back i did a shoot in this old supposedly haunted house, paramour mansion, in the neighborhood of silver lake here in los angeles. they had wardrobe set up in the basement near what was once the kitchen, where servants made the meals. first of all, this house was insane!!!! i have never been in anything like it. i wanted every single piece of furniture. the lady who owns the house collects things… and i mean she really collects things. it was better than any museum i have ever been to. but the one thing that caught my eye, possibly because it was the one thing i could try and recreate at home, were the beads hanging in the window above the kitchen sink. i loved the simplicity of it and the colors. it didn’t do much for blocking anyone from seeing inside, but it was lovely.

i decided i wanted to try and do this in my house somewhere. yes, the bathroom. it would be perfect for the bathroom. i went bead shopping and well, all those beautiful strands of beads were just out of my price range at the time. $10-20 on a strand of beads and 40 strands later, it ain’t cheap! so, i settled for a bunch of cheap wooden beads.  when i got home and started stranding them, i didn’t have enough to cover the window …so that no one could see inside.

i found this photo on tumblr…another lovely idea.

 i also tried ombre dying muslin and then ripping it into small strands to create a fringe curtain. this however, again was not enough. i was going to make a second piece, but  in between that idea i had already bought the beads. so, i decide to combine the two ideas. ripping strands of fabric and adding beads in for flare! it definitely looks homemade, but its cute. when i go into the bathroom i now have a sense of relief that something hangs in the window!

what you need:

beads

string

muslin (according to the measurements of your window!)

scissors

curtain rod

string your beads

cut your strips of fabric into the size you like. i did inch strips. if you make a little snip in the fabric, it will then easily rip. there will be lots of strings roaming around. if this annoys you then cut the whole way down. i like the fringy look, though!

tie your strands of fabric around the curtain rod. you need to measure the length of your window and this will determine where you need to tie the knot. i left about 8 -10 inches that kind of act like a valance!

now add your strands of beads in a pattern you desire! and hang your curtain!!