One question that I get pretty regularly here and on my Instagram is where our curtains came from. For the longest time (really every year up until this one) I’ve only ever been able to share direct links to off-the-rack curtain panels that I’ve purchased from Big Box Stores. Think: Amazon and Target. While I still love and stand by those curtains, I finally have more customized information and suggestions to share.

The thing that’s changed is that John and I feel confident enough to say that we’re in our “forever” home. I know that I said our previous home was it for us, but there was always something nagging in the back of my head saying that I wasn’t being honest with myself. Our last home was perfect in every way except for two things: the lack of central A.C. and the neighborhood. We always envisioned ourselves in a more secluded neighborhood with more established neighbors, which we’ve finally found. We also wanted a larger lot with more privacy, which we’ve also found. Oh, and we also now have central air conditioning! So, our current home is truly it for us (barring financial or global crisis, of course). Since we have no plans to leave, I feel ready to invest in and commit to custom curtains.

If you’ve been following along for any length of time, then you’ve read all about the custom curtains we added to our extra bedroom and the sunroom. Both sets came from a brand called UniCurt, and we are so happy with them. You use your existing rods and curtain hooks, but order totally customized curtain panels and sheers based on the dimensions within your physical space. I’ve always been so intimidated by the idea of ordering custom curtains, but UniCurt made the process super easy with the dimension calculator on their website. Today’s post isn’t sponsored, by the way. I’m just genuinely such a fan, and would highly recommend them if you’re ready to commit to custom curtain panels.

Since these curtains are, hopefully, the ones that we’ll have in this house for our lifetime, I made sure to choose wisely. I opted for neutral patterns that will work with all sorts of room designs throughout the years, and I also thought through the weight of the curtains themselves. We don’t currently use our extra bedroom as a guest room anymore, but we ordered black-out panels anyway just in case we decide to turn the space back into a bedroom with sleeping occupants who want to shield themselves from morning sun. In other words, since these types of custom curtains are more of a financial investment, we chose fabrics and styles that will work for us for decades to come.

But since we’re still on a very tight budget as millennial homeowners (I’ll be 40 next year), we do still have rooms that are outfitted entirely in cheaper off-the-rack curtain panels. While they might not be quite as tailored as our custom panels, I still love these curtains and would highly recommend them. We have these thick curtains in our primary bedroom (I love the room-darkening function), and we have these sheer linen curtains in both our formal front living room and my home office (I love the semi-transparent effect that allows those two rooms to glow during evening golden hour).

My one suggestion for making these more budget-friendly curtains look more luxurious and expensive is to order the longest length you can for your room. You can see below how we swapped from 84-inch to 95-inch lengths in our living room, primary bedroom, and bonus room. Opting for full-length curtains gave those spaces a feeling of grandeur and height that you just don’t get with truncated, shortened panels.

Let’s talk about sheer curtains for a minute because I actually have quite a lot to say about them. I’m a big, big fan of sheer panels because I love how they offer a bit of privacy and that they diffuse the light inside in such a pleasant way. I think I’ve purchase these cheap $7 sheer panels from Walmart about 2-dozen times in the last nine years. I keep them pulled permanently across the glass in our windows to filter the light, but this still allows us to look through to the outside.

The only special thing I do when ordering these sheer curtains is that I tend to buy double the amount needed so I get a nicely ruffled and full look across the face of our windows (for a double-width window, that means I order four sheer panels). I love an overly full look with my curtains, so I order outside curtain panels to be at least 1/4 more width than needed for the actual window dimensions, and double the width for sheers.

This next tip is specific to more mid-century style homes, but I also order my sheers to measure just a handful of inches beyond the bottom of the window sill in length, while the outside curtain panels are ordered to run from floor to ceiling. I’m a big, big fan of classic films and TV shows, and noticed that that’s how it was done in the 1960s, so I’ve followed suit to make our home look more period-appropriate (our home was built in the late ’60s).