Behind the Scenes of a Curtain Maker in Abergavenny

I am so lucky to be able to spend most of my time sewing and making curtains from where I live, on a farm on the outskirts of Abergavenny. Although I do spend a lot time in my workshop, I am also lucky in that I get to meet customers in their homes and help offer them advice on fabrics, colours, poles and tracks for curtains and blinds and visit beautiful locations like Usk, Raglan, Crickhowell and Monmouth. If I have a day in the workshop I normally start by seeming panels of fabric together if I have a new pair of curtains to start making. This can take an especially long time if I have pattern matching to do, which takes real precision and care but the end result is so satisfying. Then I’ll start to construct the curtain linings. If the curtains are interlined I will also construct these at the same time as the linings and then begin to lay everything out and hand sew the interlining to the panels. This is lengthy process and can take all day to attach the interlining if there are lots of drops of fabric. This is before I’ve even started to make the actual curtains, the prep is key. To jolly me along I will either listen to radio 4 or a good podcast, I particularly like history themed podcasts! It seems to go hand in hand with sewing. The constant background noise though is that of the sheep outside, they are surprisingly vocal!