How to put up curtain rail on our dreadful walls

kymbogs

Hello, after some help please!
We bought our house 5 years ago, a terrace probably over 100 years old. It's become apparent over the years that our walls are not very good at holding things up...

Earlier this year the curtain pole in the living room came off the wall, it's been there since we moved in and I assume several years beforehand. It left a lovely big missing chunk of plaster on both sides. Decided to fill these in and attempt to put the rail up slightly lower down on undamaged wall. DH borrowed FIL's masonry drill and set to work. However as soon as he started drilling the plaster just crumbled and what was meant to be a small hole just kept getting wider and wider! So we gave it up as a bad job and left it - the worst of the cold weather was over and the nights were getting lighter so we weren't so bothered about having curtains up.
Now it's getting colder and darker and I want curtains! But don'tknow what to do. I had a few suggestions from friends on facebook which all sounded pretty messy and destructive - and since the living room has just been decorated on the insurance after a flood in April, I'm not keen on making big holes in the walls either side of the window. A curtain track won't work as the window frame itself is not flat, it's sort of curvy and ornate, and the frame above the window directly meets the curvy coving so there's no flat wall to fix to.

I'm toying with the idea of screwing a square of wood onto the window frame on either side at the top to give me a flat surface to fix the pole to. But don't know if this will work at all.

Anyone got any ideas?

Many thanks for reading

Kimberley

theburt

can't work out whether this would fit the bill and it depends on the heaviness of the curtain but what about tension rods?

kymbogs

Hiya, a tension rod won't do it as the inside of the recess/frame is slightly at an angle - we have had a tension rod in there before with a light voile but even that fell off every so often! Also it wouldn't do much good for keeping the warmth in in the winter being within the recess.

puddy

i remember looking online once for blinds that are upside down, that is that they fix to the bottom of the window and you pull them up, it was a good idea because actually its the bottom of the windows that need covering for privacy, not the tops, i cant remember how they fixed now tho, but it wasnt at the top, it was the sides and bottom

kymbogs

Hiya Jenner,
We have recently fitted a roman blind for privacy - and I had to modify that as the drop is 180cm and all the ready made ones came in at 160cm! Had to make a panel to go on the bottom. I am wanting curtains to keep the heat in and the cold out in the winter and want to cover the whole window frame to block out any possible drafts.
Upsid-down blinds do sound interesting though!

Slinky_Malinky

If you had a piece of wall above your window I would have suggested fitting a length of wood to the wall then fixing your pole to that, but your idea if fixing wood each side sounds possible. Depending how heavy the curtains will be, could you fix the wood each side using lots of No More Nails to save damaging the plaster? Alternatively could you fix the pole to the ceiling? You would need to locate the timber joists to screw into for strength but if your window is coving height it may not look too bad having the pole at ceiling height and may also mean you can get away with a standard 72 inch drop curtains.

david78

I would try again with a better filler. You should be able to buy one that doesn't crumble. Don't use a masonry drill, you shouldn't need it. You are not drilling into brick.

loracan1

I had a similar problem with the curtain rail in my living room, the hole for the screw fitting just got bigger and bigger. Copious amounts of filler and matchsticks have solved it, slivers of wood would be okay too - it's to give the screw something to grip to.

rachbc

we ave the same issue - very heavy interlined curtains and walls made of quavers. I think we are going to try a track screwed into the ceiling next time ours come down

Lotus-eater

If you want to drill into the walls you need to find where there are bricks and drill into those, drill a longish hole, stick the rawplug right down to the end, make sure its tight and screw into that.
If you need to, fill the hole with no more nails or something like that and allow to dry before you hang the main pole.

phead

Lotus-eater wrote: »

If you want to drill into the walls you need to find where there are bricks and drill into those, drill a longish hole, stick the rawplug right down to the end, make sure its tight and screw into that.
If you need to, fill the hole with no more nails or something like that and allow to dry before you hang the main pole.

Having lived in a victorian flat I would agree with this, super long screws through to the bricks works well.

The other trick when the walls are just too deep is to strip off the paper, and stick a plank up (painted to match the room) with no more nails, then screw into this.