Altering curtain pleats

[VanillaSugary]

Hi

We've moved house and our curtains don't quite fit across the windows. They're about an inch too short on either side.

The curtains were made to measure for our previous house and have triple pleats. Am I crazy to think that I can unpick the pleats and remake them as double pleats to try to release a bit of the fabric across the top? There is masses of fabric across the bottom so technically the amount of material is enough to comfortably stretch across the windows.

I did take one set of curtains in to a curtain maker for altering but she buggered them up and charged me £300 so I'm loathe to waste that money again.

I've also looked this up on YouTube and the videos say that it's quite hard to do.

What happens if I just cut the thread at the pleats? Has anyone ever done this?

If you only need to release a small amount of fabric i would just unpick one of the pleats at the wall end where it will be less noticeable.

I think unpicking all of them and changing to double pleats would be a bit time consuming. In the past ive taken out all pleats and changed the top to an ordinary gathered top using ordinary curtain tape.

I would do as @bilbodog has suggested. I take it you have tried adjusting the width using the header tape cords already?

Thank you for your replies.

Some of the curtains have header tape cords and I've successfully widened those. The pleated curtains are pinch pleats (I think that's the correct term) and everything is sewn up - beautifully, I might add!

Great point about loosening the ones at the end. Thanks - I'll try it!

Do you have spare length on them? If you do then how about just chopping off the old header tape and sewing on the one you want lower down?

You can unpick the pleats but you don't have to re-sew them. It takes a bit of maths, but you can re-divide them to fit and then form the pleats by using curtain hooks only. So you have the curtains flattened out and you put hooks in the right places and then put two hooks through each curtain ring (or track glider if you have tracks). You end up with cartridge pleats which I think look more contemporary anyway. Pics attached.

Brilliant! Here are my curtains so you can see how they've been pleated. As you'll see from the back, they don't have the tape. Sorry about the spider mess. Guess I should have cleaned them before I rehung them

Just unpick one set or pleats at the non- moving ends of the curtains

Agree with others, just unpick the pleat narest the wall. It'll look fine.