Talk To Me About Curtain Material

[roses2]

I'm looking for a set of curtains and the materials these days seem to be mainly polyester. I went to a curtain shop and the lady advised cotton is best if I want to wash them regularly which I think they will as they are for my MIL who lives abroad in a dusty country.

I've narrowed it down to two choices (both the same price):
Laura Ashley 100% cotton curtains with a 50% polyester lining
www.next.co.uk/g25743s11/430207#430207
or
Voyage Maison 100% cotton curtains with a 100% cotton lining
www.maisonwhite.co.uk/product/voyage-maison-ilinizas-poppy-curtains/

Can anyone tell me about the benefits of one lining over the other please? I can't find much online.

Actually apologies the Voyage Maison curtains are 5% linen! Any disadvantages to that? Will they wash well?

Actually polyester is probably the best fabric for constant machine washing without shrinking. It will never hang as well as traditional fabrics.
Linen Union is a traditional curtain fabric that has the durability of cotton and the soft hang of linen.
Lots of fabrics are 100% cotton.
A problem occurs when fabric and lining are mismatched and one shrinks more than the other when washed.

Thank you! Does this mean 100% polyester is better than a cotton polyester blend?

Agree with @17to35, especially about the problem with different shrinkage rates of natural vs man-made fibres. Shrinkage usually occurs during the first wash, so ideally fabric needs to be pre-shrunk (i.e. washed) BEFORE being made into an item (curtain, garmet, etc.). Unfortunatelly, many manufacturers don't bother with this step nowadays. And that aside, I'd say it is risky to wash lined/interlined curtains, as some materials, like blackout lining, may not be supposed to be washed at all.

Looking at the curtains in the first link (from Next), the description says "dry clean only". This most certainly means that if you wash them, the face and lining fabrics will shrink at different rates and the curtains will never hang the same. Can't see care insturctions on the second link.

Thanks that makes sense that the main curtain fabric should be the same material as the lining. So should I be looking for 100% polyester curtains so I can machine wash them?

All of the polyester curtains on the John Lewis website say dry clean only. I usually don't pay attention to this and wash dry clean items on a low temp and low spin delicate cycle anyhow.

The only polyester curtains I have dealt with are IKEA ones that I altered for a landlord friend.
They are machine washed regularly between tenancies.

Thank you all, really appreciated. I'll keep looking looking some non grey 100% polyester pencil pleat curtains. Not as easy as it sounds!

Ok I’ve just washed my cotton polyester blend bedroom curtains which were very dirty! I measured them, put them on a 20’c no spin delicate wash and drip dried them outside. They measured the same so I’m probably totally overthinking the fabric choice!

The Voyage Maison curtains turned up today and they are hideous! The material is good quality but absolutely covered in flowers on every square inch. The pattern looked a little more sparse in the picture. So I'm sending them back and now I know I can wash polycotton in my machine I have gone for these plain gold ones instead:

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/124632776000?var=425562654045&_trkparms=ispr%3D1&hash=item1d04b13d40:g:GoYAAOSwJDhgSkqW&amdata=enc%3AAQAGAAACoPYe5NmHp%252B2JMhMi7yxGiTJkPrKr5t53CooMSQt2orsSxXDXcCydCuSj2Tq2S%252F3GnpCD2XFHnWdqwvyM374cCQ9GkfYdlfYlA%252B%252Fyx6cbs6cI5sq283oZPtCMXmna1zur2jIUKxLu3GmUGLVR8MBB7fmMDCU%252F2evHhQZECEYwDaShyF%252FrkH8FSZbK7U4H0b%252BY61exggGYXjnmLe8U24QDOdbvKBXdU5PmxBL8W%252B3vyuobjyJVi68HaIVXcPjLPqMCLr0OHR1cKhYc1SP%252B%252BK%252FY%252BirWoGAbVoHAJMK7U%252Ffv316XixctmFfkgadmRJ9T9Eb48HD2BO0FjVjgOwa3xh1q4cly%252Fcj0HEuuO2MjSCiNHm%252BMcAhkh6AIoi%252FkhhoipT0IimpeoL30Tp1IzR2PePbMGPQg0ufb2ViT3CCH3%252Bwo3%252B3NuU12pg71XafiiHC79nIoDnjURrBYM2gIyM2SOos4ueZ56GIzl3VelT6aWevCRLtx9fpwaF%252BFuUmrre6N2HtHKcLBOjLFsRECBFwXyeqg0%252FsNTO6ZVUzo%252FUZFK2D8rX2Z5%252BYV1vRi9XYuqCCALz9esqzKkOcR0uUZiLm7%252BmZzgFY7hqPikhlZB0ZqOY0fFm8o0uTR3HBDsxAFAbi0B5UfSeBcIoJruKHMsQ%252F8LlJ775XxXrckooiFXZVZ%252FVf72T5wSqfBQEHLKa7TWZJgq0DgvXzZ1zPPyUnclK%252B4HA%252FcsrjBQtPlY4wf1qolC1OxrfStgp852d%252BceZwpHiWzzMosI2HDbvYnT2mtQ4js6OBjWszhyBBzyDR%252FhRqMkQ4%252Bnnwwm1FHyJE1%252BEzE3qcYJFhgDMt%252BPAP8Qt3l8eo%252BRq4%252B5dQECkM1huJbY%252FEJ66B9T2F24tNTHQPP%252BPmhMLVD5xLbfQ%253D%253D%7Cclp%3A2334524%7Ctkp%3ABFBMxoTLp6pf