Friday, February 19, 2010

Repurposing a vintage tablecloth into a window treatment!

Since my last post I sat down and got to work to complete the window treatment for our brand new kitchen!
OLD KITCHEN
NEW KITCHEN
I loved the old tablecloth pieces I found, very vintage, and HANDMADE-can you believe it...It's a great heavy weight, ivory with time, and in perfect condition...The hours someone would have spent creating it...It had already been hacked up and was for sale in two pieces, but it needed some reinforcement for a curtain rod pocket. This is one piece, I still have a smaller piece to use somewhere else! I hate seeing such a treasure go to waste, it needed a new life and purpose! How perfect to make into a window treatment with very minimal sewing...The window really needed more than boring old blinds...
TADA!!!!
I love how my kitchen looks tidy...I jammed the dish rack and other assorted stuff on the other counter to take the picture. ;-)
For the curtain rod to go through smoothly, and to make it easier to sew the pocket for the rod I had to add some fabric. I wanted the light to shine through the piece, so I just wanted fabric for the rod pocket, not to back the whole piece.
I started by serging a piece of white cotton muslin-type fabric to the back...An old sheet was perfect for this. Now I have extra white cotton on hand, too. :-)
I serged the sides and bottom for a nice finished edge.
Then I ironed the bottom muslin serged hem up, so there was a nice crease to follow, and folded the top serged edges once over so no edges were showing and pinned it together.
Fed it through the sewing machine fairly slowly so it didn't catch. That was it! I gathered it on two sides to give it some pizzaz. I tried it without, and it was just too long and plain. All I did was gather 5 of the circle "centers" together and a couple stitches, done. The stitches had to go on the "finished" side so it "fell" into a nice swag.
Sharing on the party circuit!!!

15 comments:

  1. Very pretty! I love that the treatment doesn't block out any light which is a total must in my rainy and cloudy 95% of the time climate.

    Thanks for linking up to SNS!
    FJ Donna

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  2. Beautiful lace, it really looks good on your window!!

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  3. Wow, what a great job repurposing. How pretty is that in your kitchen window! And yes, your kitchen looks very tidy!

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  4. What a beautiful window treatment! I love it. Wonderful job!

    I hope you'll come check out AtticMag this week. JaneF did a great job posting a tour of my home.
    Allison

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  5. Love this! I could never get away with it in my house, but otherwise I would so do this! Great reuse of a lovely vintage piece.

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  6. That is soooo pretty! Now I need to go treasure hunting for some old lace! Love it...what a pretty way to welcome spring into your kitchen!!

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  7. That turned out beautifully, what a nice view while you're doing dishes:)

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  8. How Clever you are Desiree
    I haven't sewed in years and often see something I would like to turn into something else... Putting love back into and old piece must reward you everyday you look at it..!!

    Thanks for your lovely comments... You know I am dreading summer finishing here.... I may have to change countries to avoid winter.. haha xx Julie

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  9. I love how this turned out. It's so very pretty.

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  10. This is soooo cute! I have seen table coverings so many times & never thought of using them like this.

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