One of the most important design elements in a beautifully designed home is custom drapery. Properly designed and fabricated window fashions add beauty, texture and softness to your room. I always add them to a client’s room design!

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Draperies add a vertical element to your room to draw the eye upward and visually increase the space. With so many hard surfaces used in today’s homes, fabric window fashions add much needed softness and sound absorption.

But window fashions must be designed professionally, expertly fabricated or it’s best to skip them altogether. Nothing takes away more from a beautifully designed room than cheaply constructed draperies – limp, skimpy, too short curtains will subtract rather than add to the space.  One of the challenges I face as a designer is educating my clients on the dramatic impact of draperies in a room– the list of objections can be endless: I don’t want to cover up my view, draperies are for grandma’s house, or the most common –I already have plantation shutters.

In reality, custom draperies do not need to block beautiful views – they frame and enhance them. Consider a beautiful view by day…  becomes a black hole on the wall at night. With the use of dressmaking details, sumptuous fabrics and trims our draperies will remind you nothing of your grandmother’s home. Did you know that draperies are a necessary layer over shutters to balance the horizontal aspect of the wood slats and provide a layer of softness.

And when it comes to energy efficiency and savings, I offer the highest R-value products on the market to help you beautify the window and prevent heat transfer through the glass.

With my laptop, digital camera and one hour in your home, I can create a digital design of your window with the proposed window treatment, to allow you to preview the design before you invest in the purchase.

After you work with Tami Smight…. you’ll wish you had more windows!

Tami Smight Interiors, a full-service interior design firm, has been gracing southern California homes with warm, accessible designs since 2004.

As a certified professional interior designer, Tami Smight shares expert design tips, tricks and trends in her column. Check out her articles in our SCV “Your Home Inside And Out” section.