Are You Underestimating the Impact of Custom Window Treatments?

An image in a catalog selling custom furniture I picked up and Paris Deco Home in January. A beautiful piece no doubt, but I’d argue the ripple fold drapery catches your eye first and has a bigger impact on the room.

Some of the most progressive interior design and home decor brands lean on window treatments to elevate their products in advertising. Can you take a page from their playbook to elevate the design of your home?

—

If you are reading this, there is a very good chance you are passionate about design and discerning about the finishes, furniture, fixtures and art in your home. As someone who makes their living straddling the world of custom home products, interior design, and contracting / renovation, I do my best to remain acutely aware of what is happening in the home design space, often aided by the social media algorithms that know the brands and publications I follow, the products I click on, and the account I like an engage with in my quest to discover what’s new and stay up to date.

What this leads to is a pretty steady stream online ads selling things like furniture, rugs, and home decor in nearly every category. And one of my favorite things to do is keep an eye on how brands in other categories lean on window treatments to elevate the products they sell.

It’s not only a good way to see how brands and companies (often with big corporate budgets) attempt to elevate products through a cohesive design-scape in their ads, it’s also a good way to trend spot and get a feel for the direction the wind may be shifting. The ironic thing I tend to notice is that when you strip away the ad copy or photo description, quite often the most prominent thing in the ad itself is the window treatment (I may be slightly biased, but that is usually where my eyes go). Even though an ad may be selling a sofa, side table, lamp or a rug, the most prominent, and dare I say impactful thing in the photo itself is often the window treatment, especially when it comes to higher end, large and luxurious window treatments like draperies, or things with a lot of unique character like roman shades in a special fabric.

Even if the window treatment is not playing a starring role, it is playing an important support role, part of a short list of ensemble characters that work in orchestra to elevate an entire scene, usually going hand in had with an impactful piece of art, or perhaps a light fixture of piece of furniture.

Front and center on Apple’s news feed. Beautiful vaulted ceilings, but no doubt the star of this image is the (pretty interesting) roman shade.

A fun selection of screen shots from Instagram. Window treatments undoubtedly elevate these scenes.

So how can you learn to apply this in your own home’s design?

For one, focus on not only the material you are selecting for a window treatment, but also how it will look at different times of the day, where and when you see it and from what vantage points in your home, and then of course, how it will work in concert with other piece you have selected. One of the biggest oversights I see from potential clients is an understanding (or lack thereof) of how any given window treatment interacts with light, and not only in how it blocks or obstructs it. What pattern or detail do you see when it’s backlit? Does the color present the same way when it’s dark outside and bright inside? Is it translucent, and does light passing through the material change how you see things dramatically. These are all important when considering what is the right window treatment for a given space. Then of course, on the most basic level, does it give you the light control and privacy you need?

I often say that window treatments are somewhere between furniture and art, but in reality their functionality and how they are relied on to control lighting in a room often makes them more impactful than either. Their sheer scale relative to other parts of your home, how they most often appear directly in your eye-line, in addition to the things discussed above mean that window treatments really do punch above their weight when it comes to not only the design of your home, but also your personal comfort.

And if some of the most progressive brands in a highly competitive interior design world feel the need to include high end custom window treatments in advertising the products they sell, the impact they will have on the design, mood, and functionality of your home can’t be overstated.