Some of the most beautiful fabrics tend to be those that convey warmth and richness and luxury. People tend to be drawn to dark colors, especially those with patterns printed or woven into them. The issue that sometimes comes up is that when the window treatment is installed, you can lose the fabric’s beauty because the light is coming from outside and your eye can’t pick up the color on the draperies. The only time that you truly see the true nature of your drapes is at night. One solution that I’ve suggested to my clients is placing an uplight, or track lighting system so that the lights can be turned on and directed toward the fabric. This allows the material to “pop” even under backlighting situations.

Check out this beautiful fabric, sourced from Kasmir Fabrics. It is a very luxurious material, but as you can see, it tends to lose some of its character when the light comes from behind.

Dark Draperies

Drapes with “Front Lighting”

One mistake that many “professionals” make is that they show fabrics with the sunlight shining directly on the material. This is a highly inaccurate way to test out the fabric. Unless the sun will be hitting the face of the fabric as it hangs, you should never do it. The fabric needs to be viewed as it will be hanging, regardless of how much you desire to see it in different ways. I’ve seen clients who worked with other drapery designers who made this error to find that the customer was not happy with the end result. If you are going to invest in quality custom draperies, you need to do it right the first time!