Tailored flat panel valance

I have decided to change the design of our family room at our river house.  I loved the look back in 2004, but I am ready for a change, and 8 years is pretty long for me not change something. My plan is to take out the county fabrics and update them to a more modern casual design.

The funny thing is, I hadn’t actually planned on doing anything in the family room/dining room but when I saw these fabrics at Calico Corners I needed an excuse to use them somewhere!

I was racking my brain on where I could use them.  That is when it dawned on me that the fabrics blend perfectly with existing color I have on the walls and the deep red couch we have in the family room at the river house.  So, I said to myself, why not?  It has been 8 years, time for a change.

I wanted to keep the red and golds in the room but take out the sage green and bring in blues. The stylized more modern floral fabric was the perfect color pallet I needed to bring all the colors together and update the room.  It is called Wonderland in Pearl   I decided to use it on the drapery panel on the slider and throw pillows on the couch. The Charlotte Moss blue fabric I am going to use on the dining chairs and a corner cushion by the front door

I liked the idea of using the gold circle fabric in a more tailored style to replace the gathered country valences in the room.

But once I got the fabric, I couldn’t decide which side to use on the flat roman panels.  Silly me, I didn’t even realize that this fabric was reversible.  Guess what it is called?  Plateau reversible fabric, how did I miss that?   It is a very high quality fabric for the price, I was pleasantly surprised.  So I taped a section of each side to the main window and left it there for a couple of days to see if I ended up liking one or the other better

That didn’t help, I still couldn’t decide.  So I waited for the drapes to be made in the Wonderland fabric to see if that would help me make the decision.  It did.  Once I put the drapes up I decided to use the darker side of the fabric. The cream side was getting washed out next to the bright colors of the drapes.  So this weekend I dove into making six tailored flat panel valances.

I thought a 1″ x 3″ board would be deep enough for the valance.  But once I got 3 of the six done I was not liking it.  The depth was too shallow, and it looked one dimensional.  So off to Home Depot I went, and had them cut all the valence boards for me in a 1″ x 4″ instead.  Even though I had to start all over, it was a huge difference and well worth the time and staple removing.

{excuse the blue tape on the wall, it is for a piece of abstract artwork, I was trying to see what size would look good}

My proudest moment was when I got this corner section done.  I actually only had to make it once, which is really unusual for me! {for whatever reason my all the pictures I took of this area got all grainy looking}

The drapes were made incorrectly, so those came back with me to get fixed.  But here is how they looked when I temporarily put them up next to the tailored flat panel valance

My initial plan was to just change out the county style fabrics for a quick and easy update.  But once I got the new fabrics in the room, I realized some of the other things in the room needed to be changed out as well.  {like the boob lights in the ceiling, they stick out like a sore thumb now!  those are for sure going to be changed out} So I guess this won’t be a quick and easy update, like I originally thought, but that is ok, I know that I will not be changing it for at least another 5 years, so it is worth it.

I think these valances are such a classic and easy update for any window.  So stay tuned, I will be doing a tutorial this week on how to make these valances.

You can  now see the full tutorial here.