Velvet curtains - bad creases - advice needed please

[Selks]

Hi all,

I've been given a pair of lovely green velvet Ikea curtains by a friend. They've been in a bag for weeks and are quite creased and crumpled. They also need hemming.
What's the best way to get rid of the creases? Should I just hang them and wait for the creases to drop out? Or can they be ironed? - not sure if they are cotton or a cotton/manmade mix. They are unlined, for info. Was also thinking I should probably wait until they are uncreased to hem them, to ensure a straight hem?

Thanks in advance.

Anyone?

hang them in the bathroom, close to but not in the shower. turn shower on hot. close the door , Room steams up, steam makes creases fall out.

or hang on windows, steam with a wallpaper stripper

I would either iron them very gently by putting on a cool setting and putting a damp tea towel on top and ironing over the top. You can gradually increase the temperature until it's getting the creases out. Alternatively you could hang them unhemmed, then lightly spray with water and let them hang until the creases drop out, then hem.

Thanks Jasper. The bathroom idea is a good one

Daisy, should I iron them on the 'pile' side (the fabric front) or on the reverse side?

I would probably iron on the reverse, but make sure you iron in the direction of the pile

I would never iron velvet without a proper velevet ironing mat. The pile will flatten. Stick to steaming it

Hem first. If your iron has a steam setting, you can then hang the curtains, and then steam down the lengths - holding the iron vertically up to them.

Tie some strips of fabric or plastic flat loosely around the hung curtains when they are open and leave for about a week - that way they will 'set' a little in a nice position, so that when you are drawing them back and forth they will stay in shape. This is what the professional curtains hangers did with ours and they have stayed lovely.

Also - another tip. When hemming, put weights in the bottom. Particularly with velvet, this will help the creases to drop out and keep them neat.

Ah yes, weights in the bottom, I'd forgotten about that. Bet they'll hang really nicely with weights.

Thanks all again; really helpful.

If your iron has a steam shot button it might steam vertically. If so, hang the curtains at the window, pull them closed one at a time to get the single curtain as flat as possible and hover the iron a centimetre or two away from the curtain pressing the steam shot button. Get as much steam as you can into the fabric and leave to dry completely before repeating with the other curtain. If you've got or can borrow a steam cleaner or steam wallpaper stripper you could use those also.

For reference, looking on the ikea website their dark green velvet curtains are 100% cotton.

Get them dry cleaned. Then pin them with weights and then hem them.

Thanks both. Frankenstein, that's along the lines of what I was thinking of doing, cheers. Fuzzled....you've had similar problems with velvet curtains? Can't see how dry cleaning will sort the creases though..

Our dry cleaners do steam pressing too - much easier.

And I didn't let mine drop before hemming - had to redo and it never looked the same as you could see the first hem mark

Ahh, now that makes a lot of sense! Thanks