The No-Fail Curtain Hanging Hack For Perfectly Level Results Every Time
The curtains in your key living spaces occupy a significant portion of your walls' surface area, and as a result, even a slight misalignment in the way that they hang can detract from the design appeal and aesthetic of your home. Unfortunately, holding up a curtain rod in one hand and a box level in the other can quickly make the process of straightening out these fixtures an annoying, time-consuming project. If you're dealing with a wider window, it can be especially difficult to determine if the brackets you're about to put up are at an equal distance and height from the center of the window. Luckily, you can easily create a bracket-hanging template that guarantees that your curtains will be in a perfectly level position above your window frame.
All that you'll need to make your own curtain hanging template is a few pieces of paper, a spare screw, and some tape. On YouTube, @stephanieboothhome has a great tutorial that highlights just how simple and effective this method can be. In the video, Stephanie tapes two pieces of paper together around the corner of her window frame, against the wall. She then pokes a hole through the papers with the screw where she wants to install her curtain bracket, and then flips the papers over and places them against the upper corner on the opposite side of the window. The hole in the papers then aligns with where her second bracket should go.
Tips for hanging your curtains with the help of a template
Using the curtain-hanging trick from Stephanie's video is fairly easy, but you need to figure out where you're going to install your initial curtain bracket before trying it. Begin by measuring the length of your curtains or checking the package for their dimensions. Then, determine how high on the wall you're going to hang them. In most cases, the perfect curtain rod will look best about half a foot above the window frame, and the curtains themselves should be either just touching the floor or floating within an inch of it. The only exception to this rule is if you want to try the puddled curtain look in your home. Even some custom drapers recommend that your curtains should also hang between 6 and 15 inches away from the sides of your window for an optimal aesthetic. All of these measurements will aid you in determining exactly where to put your first bracket. Plus, they're also important when choosing the perfect curtains for your space.
After using your paper template to identify where your curtain brackets should go, consider breaking out your tape measure to double-check the distance between each hole and the nearest top corner of your window frame. If you're planning to hang the curtains farther to the side of the window, you might want to make your template from cardboard or ledger paper, rather than traditional letter-size sheets so that it has some additional width.