Just had a shock when the local shop quoted 900 pounds for a pair of fitted curtains! I could buy a bike for that!

Any one got a good place on the net to order ready-to-hang curtains?

Cheers.

Econermine – we've been getting curtains from them for 20 years.

They do a good job at a very good price, offer a variety of curtain and blind types made to measure, and can get fabric from pretty much every supplier you can think of, even if it's not shown in their catalogue.

We got ours for the new house priced up at the local shop (trying to support local businesses etc), the price took our breath away, so we asked Econermine if they could get the same fabric. They could, quoted less than half the price, bought the fabric in specially for us, were very nice about it when it turned out we'd given them the wrong colour code (ahem) and they had to return the material to the supplier, and sent us curtains we're very pleased with about three weeks later.

Somehow I hate the fact that I have an answer to this question 😐

I'm glad you did answer it – thanks!

I went visibly white when the woman in the shop quoted me the price…I was thinking 200 quid tops for a luxury curtain and supporting a local business…

Thanks again.

Darn, why did you answer? I need to find money for new curtains now 🙁

My wife makes ours 😀

Just had a shock when the local shop quoted 900 pounds for a pair of fitted curtains! I could buy a bike for that!

Compare and contrast:

Just had a shock when the local shop quoted 2000 pounds for a pair of fitted curtainsbike! I could buy a bike car for that!

Properly made to measure curtains will last years.

Somewhere like John Lewis or Laura Ashley supply really high quality ready made curtains.

They may sound expensive to you. A decent fabric costs anything over £20 per metre. Lining is around £5 per metre. A specialist curtain maker will charge between £20 – £30 per width (drop) depending on the heading. This all adds up.

I am a professional curtain maker and offer to make customers own fabric up. In other words if they get the fabric from John Lewis, they are cutting out the middle man by using me. Obviously this is if they were using the made to measure service. I know John Lewis charge an extra 20% more than myself.

A women would be astounded that a man would spend £500 on a bike frame.
However a man can't get his mind around the fact that a woman would spend the same amount for a couple of made to measure Roman blinds or curtains.

Bunnyhop – my wife has given me a long lecture on you get what you pay for so I see where you're coming from.

Curtains are a new world to me though.

In regards to the Econermine service, could I ask please how you see professional curtain makers stack up to them?

IMO the the bigger the service e.g. Econermine, the more likely it's been made in a factory.
The curtains sound good, as they are lined. I couldn't see anywhere if they are hand finished.

My own customers tend to use me for the really posh rooms (sitting, lounge) and have maybe good quality ready mades in the bedrooms.

I specialise in Roman blinds and know that I'm about half the price of most specialist shops.

Also many of my customers live in Cheltenham and London and drive for miles to Stockport where I'm based, as I'm half the price.

I think you should shop around. My customers come to me mostly through word of mouth. So ask around.
I never tell them the cost of my bikes though, they'd never understand 🙂

I was thinking 200 quid tops for a luxury curtain and supporting a local business…

Average window is say 2.5m wide. For floor length curtains,they'd be 2m tall as well. How wide is curtain material? Guess at 1m, that's still 10 metres of material, more if it's not as wide as 1m. So, 10 metres @ £20 per metre is your £200 budget before you start adding on the cost of lining, and the charge for making the curtains…

Have you tried looking online for curtains? You can get some pretty cheap quotes if you ask around. You local shop might not always give the best price these days.

Curtains on STW? MTFU and just walk around naked with the world looking in!