I’m excited to share this fun project from one of our new contributor’s Anu from Nalle’s House. I stumbled upon Nalle’s House a few months ago and was hooked. Her style is clean and fresh and I think you’ll be her newest follower. Check out more of her projects on her blog Nalle’s House.
Hi there! I’m so happy to be here to share this simple dip dyed curtain project.
I have been trying to update and decorate my husband’s den in time for Father’s Day. We live in a small mid century ranch and have been trying to bring a little simple and modern style to it. Space is at a premium in our small house, but since my husband runs a business from home, he really needed a dedicated space to work in so why not give it some style!
One of the areas that I felt needed some more interest was the window/curtains. So I decided to give these simple Ikea curtains a little dip in some dye.
Here is how I went about dyeing the curtains:
- To prep my curtains for dyeing, I opened up the hems and washed them. I knew that the white thread that was on the hems wouldn’t take the dye so it made sense to open them up and re-hem them with a thread that matched the dye once the curtains were dyed.
- While they were still damp, I pinned the curtains wrong-sides together and marked where I wanted the dye to go up to. Pinning the curtains together this way meant that I would end up with two identical panels after they were dyed.
- I used Dylon dye in Jeans Blue. I needed two packages since I had a large amount of water. The dye was mixed according to the directions on the package in a large plastic garden tote. I also set up a clothes drying rack to hold my curtains while the bottoms were hanging out in the dye.
- Then I was ready to start dyeing. I dunked the bottoms of the pinned curtains in the dye up to my mark. I was going for a bit of a gradient look so I gradually moved my curtains out of the dye. The whole dyeing time was about an hour. The initial light section of the curtain required only 5-10 minutes in the dye. I continued moving the curtains up every 15 minutes to get my faded look.
- Once the 60 minutes was up, I rinsed the dyed portion of the curtains in another bucket of plain cold water. You may need someone to help hold the un-dyed portion to avoid the dye running onto the rest of the curtain.
- The curtains were then hung to dry making sure that the white part was kept away from the dyed portion
- Once dry, I hemmed the bottoms, gave them a quick iron and they were ready to be hung.
Since I had to re-hem the curtains, I decided to make them a little shorter and added rings for a more modern look. I love how they give a little more colour and interest to the room now. My husband and even my dad (who generally thinks my decorating projects are a little nuts) really liked them. So they got the guy stamp of approval. 🙂
I hope you enjoyed this project!
Thanks Michelle for having me here!
Hey there! I’m Michelle; I’m an Passionate DIY’er and in constant pursuit of how to bring beauty to my house full of men (3 boys + 1 hubby). Stick around and see what I’ve got up my hard-working sleaves!
Love this project! I love the layers of each dip. Looks fantastic!
The curtains turned out amazing! Brilliant idea. So glad to see Anu is going to be contributing to your blog. I love her style.
They look awesome! I love blue and I love that you simply updated what you already had.
Anu did a great job didn’t she!
Won’t they stain the white wall as you didn’t use any fixant after the dye?
I have indigo I could use, but I’m afraid this would happen
XOXO,
CRIS
wonderful idea! showed it to my gf and she is already looking for the best colors 🙂
Nice work showing the process in the pictures. I can’t wait to try it!