Net curtains are not a legal requirement!!??

[NetcurtainProblem]

Have had a visit from the person whose house backs onto ours. We have small gardens so it’s very close (new build estate).

She asked me to get net curtains! Apparently it’s a legal requirement for privacy and modesty reasons when houses are so close together ?
That they can see me eating in my kitchen and can see directly into my bedroom.

If I’m getting dressed / changed I shut the actual curtains??

In the morning I do like to open them and have tea / breakfast in bed. I’m not doing naked pilates or anything!
My kitchen table faces out towards the garden but I fail to see how them being able to see me eating is a modesty issue ?

I explained I don’t like nets. Also I can see that they have nets????!!!!!

She told me she will take it further as it could be seen as a nuisance issue ?

I’d be telling her to piss off! But if you’re worried they are looking in, you can privacy film which acts like a mirror to people outside, however you can still see out from inside the house.

Yes, steamed up windows make a great canvas. Please don't do what my DH did once though when he wrote ' help me ' on the bathroom mirror of a house build he was working on. New occupants moved in , when mirror steamed up ,called the police.

We had this in a place we rented in Sicily, we only discovered about only working in daytime when I went out to the car late at night and OH had had a shower, he was walking around starkers.

I think you should take up naked Pilates 😂

A friend of mine had the police round because his neighbour said he was wanking off, and they could see (he does not have net curtains).

He was eating a KFC, and his "penis" was actually a piece of chicken. Nothing happened to him.

I suggest that with the least amount of effort possible from you (the odd "yup", "uhuh", "sure" etc) you let her exhaust all her legal avenues freely and fully. You might also like to, for example, open your mail at your breakfast table, or in bed with your morning cup of tea. Whilst reading it, you might like to laugh uproariously, for example, while gazing out of your window. Perhaps move the kitchen bin closer to your window and stand up to put your mail firmly and fully into said bin.

What a tool. People are so weird sometimes.

You can see out through nets. They won’t be obstructing her view. You just can’t see in.

my new favourite phrase, might have to crack this one out at work 😂😂

😂

If she is older, she may be remembering or have heard of the sections of various building regulations on "modesty", these gave rise to the requirement for obscured glass on bathroom windows (no longer a requirement) and that electric light fittings in bedrooms had to be positioned centred to the window and no more than 3 feet from that window to prevent a silhouette show! (that's why in older houses the ceiling light point is often off centre to the room, near the window). But its all history...

Plenty of people!

Off the top of my head… Buckingham Palace for starters! Downing Street too!

Not everyone wants or likes blinds or shutters, modern buildings tend to be closer together, as do the back- to- back terracing up and down the country. Not everyone wants people looking into their homes!

People like their privacy, nets do a good job.

Whats the issue here?🤷‍♀️

Sounds like the kind of thing Mrs Hobbs would do.

Blimey OP, she sounds nuts! I think the last time I lived anywhere with net curtains was about 1987…

Does this neighbour have a slimline white telephone with automatic redial by any chance?

These days people have this weird idea they can control others' behaviour. Batty. No they can't!

Do what suits you because there is literally a design code to do with minimum separation of new builds and if your development complies she is wasting her time.

Is this you OP?

What you need to do @NetcurtainProblem Is to tie a length of cotton around all four sides of your windows. Then invite her in to admire your new nets, they are, you will need to explain to her , a new 2026 ecologically friendly design , the hole in the net is the same size as the window to save on cotton thread which being organic uses up gallons and gallons of water to produce. It also save on washing, and allows light into the room saving the need to turn your lights on.

We have nets only in our sitting room which has a pavement outside it and for our benefit not anyone else's. The neighbours opposite have none but I never know what they're up to in their house as I have a life, unless they are drunk and noisy in their outside hot tub late at night which is rare but annoying. Then we have our curtains shut and only hear them.

OP, you don't happen to know a bunch of people in a local AmDram club do you? Maybe you could host a murder mystery evening in your dining room. Acting the whole thing out obviously, with props.

You may be interested to know (or of course, you may not, but I'm going to tell you anyway) that the net curtains in Downing Street and Buck palace, and in fact all government buildings, are there to protect against bomb blast. Dates from the IRA attacks in London in the 70s.

Fact of the day. No need to thank me!

You could get film on your windows that reflect the light. It’s cheap if you put it on yourself. Not that you should have to, but you might feel less uncomfortable about the weirdo neighbours.

Thank you anyway!

I didn’t know that, it does, of course make sense. I suspect that both buildings would probably have nets, voiles or wherever anyway, due to the amount of people milling around looking at the buildings.

You could take her quite literally and put up some lovely white fishing nets. That's probably the line I'd take if she continued to go on about it.

Something like this

It's frosted, but with the lights on you can fully make out cock, boobs and where hands are washing. I'd lived here about 6 months when I realised I'd likely been flashing too and promptly sorted it!

Its right in front of the window, all of the streets are like it, most of us have a bathroom roller blind up and then have a shower curtain that hangs like a normal window curtain you pull across. They don't.