Choosing Fabrics for Draperies - as part of the expert series by GeoBeats. There are a number of different ways that you can go about draperies. Things that your going to want to think about is how formal or casual you want your drapes to look, how much light you want to have come through the fabric, if it is really meant to block out light completely or if it is just a simple obscuring of what is on the other side of the window, and just a simple block. If you are looking for just something that is light and flowy, you can use something like a cotton lawn that is very lightweight it will let a lot of light through. You know the lighter the print, the more the light is going to come through. You could also use what is called a quilting weight or medium weight cotton there is going to be a little bit less light that is going to come through that. These are going to be the more economical choices, much less expensive than like a home deck, heavy weight, real traditional draperies sort of fabric. Other things that you could look at, there are some more casual home deck weight, it is almost like a light canvas weight. Again it is going to let even less light through. It is going to hang a little bit stiffer. It is not going to have a real flowy look to it. It could be used for a more structured design like box pletes or things like that rather than just a soft ripple sort of look to your curtains. Velveteen could be a fun and tactile choice, it is going to be very opaque, it will not let very much light in at all. This is another home deck weight. Its is a cotton satin, sort of have a little bit of sheen to it, again, also opaque. As far as prices go with the things that I am showing here are going to range from you know ten up to fifteen, twenty five almost a yard for the velveteen once you get into those more supple fabrics. These fabrics, again, width is something that you want to take into consideration when you are looking at curtains because if you need to piece it together you still need to get the same length and so that could change the price considerably. If you need to add more, there are home deck stores that have more home deck oriented, specifically fabrics that tend to jump up in price but also are much wider.