Goodwill Drapes---The REAL Story!

My last post was about the beautiful drapes I scored at the Goodwill. Now some may ask themselves, "Why don't I ever find custom sewn toile looking pinched pleat drapes at Goodwill??"

Everything in the last post was 100% true but let me shed some light on how things usually work.

I saw the two drapery panels at Goodwill and fell in love with them. I didn't buy them because they are very traditional and I wasn't sure if I wanted to go that direction in my office. Plus, it was $15.99 per panel and I was trying to cut down on my impulse buys. I thought about them the rest of the day though and by the next morning I decided that I would seriously consider buying them if they were still there. I went back to the Goodwill later on in the afternoon and (Yippee!) they were still there waiting to go home with me. I threw them into the cart and went right up to pay for them in case another shopper spied them in my cart and tried to wrestle them from me. (When you find something great, you think everyone else wants it too!) A wonderful surprise at the checkout--it was $15.99 for both drapes together! (happy dance)




So upon arriving home, I inspected them in detail. Two things I didn't notice in the store came to light:
1) The panels were two different sizes. One was the standard size and one was quite a bit bigger. (Odd.)
2) The second thing was that on the bottom edge of each of the drapes were little yellow squiggles. (Can you say cat pee? or some other ewwy thing?) Thankfully it didn't smell.

So I threw them one at a time in the washer, pinched pleats and all with stain remover and some bleach. (The drapery weights about killed my sad little dryer.)




The result? They're going to need some heavy duty ironing! Also some seams popped out at the top of the pleats on one panel. Aside from that they are absolutely beautiful! I'm glad I bought them and am looking forward to hanging them. I just need to figure out what to do with the mismatched sizes? These were professionally sewn and I hate the thought of cutting them. They're heavy duty. I hope they don't rip my rod out of the wall. The bleach totally removed the "squiggles" and slightly lightened the design. I like it even better.

So the moral of the story is that things may not always be as they seem but that they usually work out in the end. OR Just make sure to really check things out before you buy them! (duh)