DIY Drop Cloth Pergola Curtains
I am SO excited to share this recent DIY project of mine! When I first started it I was pretty skeptical. I had never looked at dropcloths as anything more than something I put on the ground, destroyed over the course of a day of painting then tossed. As this project progressed, I realized I had definitely been selling drop cloths short.
I spent a lot of time trying to find decently priced outdoor curtains for our pergola, I needed eight panels (two per post) and was not liking the prices I was seeing so I did some Pinterest-ing and decided to try my hand at drop cloth curtains, nothing to lose right? I am thrilled with the final result! They look great, were SO much less expensive than $40/panel outdoor curtains, and they are easy to replace if they get moldy from rain/sprinklers or stained from bird droppings (mine have been up since July and I haven't had to replace a single one yet).
MATERIALS:
--Scotch brand outdoor velcro fasteners (that hold up to 5 lbs)
--Metal tension curtain rod (I used a 3 foot long one tat was $2.99 at Kmart)
Step 1: Determine how many drop cloths you need depending on the type of structure you have. My pergola has four posts so I used eight drop cloths to allow for two per post.
Step 2: Determine where on your structure you want to place each curtain rod. I placed mine so that the rod was as close as possible to where the beams of the pergola intersected at each corner of the pergola.
Step 3: Using the Scotch velcro, attach the command hooks to the section of the beam where you've decided to position the curtain rod (use two hooks per rod, placing them close to the ends of each rod). Make sure to use a level so the hooks are in line. (I cannot begin to describe how awesome the outdoor velcro is, they have held my curtain rods up since July and are still holding strong after three months of temps above 100 degrees and relentless sun!)
Step 4: Determine the length of your curtains, I recommend having them just barely graze the ground. The distance between my curtain rods and the ground was 8 feet so I folded one foot of fabric over at the top of the curtain to create a ruffle at the top. To secure the fold, clip the curtain rod rings along the top of the drop cloth then slide the rings onto the metal curtain rod (I used five rings per curtain rod).
Step 5: Place your curtain rod with drop cloth attached onto the command hooks. For a draped effect, draw the curtains in towards the post, gather them and secure them to the post with any type of outdoor proof ribbon or rope (I used a thick nautical rope). Wrap it around the post a few times, double knot it and you're done!
