The dining room is under a long-term transformation. We don't "dine" much around here: we're more of the "throw the burgers on the grill and each on a blanket on the grass" kind of family. So the dining room is pretty much wasted space except for once every two years or so. It does get a lot of use though as a Lego building room. So my idea was to incorporate the pretty, fancy room with the fun. The fancy? A piece by this artist who does gorgeous copper sculptures. It is our favorite thing in the whole house; this room is and will also be decorated around this piece.
The fun? Well, I thought this fabric was a good start. A little artsy, a little lego-ish fun, right? I first saw this idea on Pinterest as a "no sew valance" idea.
I wanted more of a lined looked, so I adjusted a bit for mine, but the original idea was great. I didn't like what I had in the dining room....boring and bland.
The project starts with 1x4 pine boards: the cheaper the better, because nothing of the wood will show. The only important part is that the boards are straight. I first needed to decide how far out I wanted the valance to be from the window: I decided on two inches, so I cut two pieces of 1X4 two inches long. The next piece depends on how long you want the valance. I decided on just bigger than the frame of my window. I ended up with a "U" shaped piece 2 inches deep and 36 inches long.
To make the valence was like making a big pillow case. I cut a piece of the fabric that was about the length I wanted, and width plus about 10 inches. I figured this would be a test case, so I wasn't too worried about having to do it a time or two to get it the way I wanted, so I didn't spend a lot of time stressing over measurements.
Fabric is sewn right sides facing together; sew three sides around, then turn and press. The remaining side can be hand sewn shut, or as I did, just machine stitched on the outside.
The fabric was then just simply staple gunned onto the board. I did a little inverted pleat in the middle for a touch of interest; you could just have it straight across also.
Hanging it on the wall just required a few L brackets and screws, and viola! Valances.
I have more to share on this project, but my focus tonight is elsewhere; more to come in a few days. To see what I'll be up to, visit http://www.cmgstories.blogspot.com/ for the upcoming adventure we have in store at 5am tomorrow. For now, goodnight!
To check out the artist of the copper sculpture, see http://www.maxhoward.com/. He's amazing! We hope to own another of his sculptures or fountains one day.
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