Blacksheep House – Curtain Tracks for a Grand Design

Some places are special. Blacksheep House, on the Isle of Harris, is one of them. This magical building is a renovation of a traditional Hebridean blackhouse. It looks out over the sea, and everything about it is stunning.

So much so, it won the 2008 Grand Designs Home of the Year award.

When the owners of the house decided to install a curtain pole for a semi-circular wall of glass, they came to us. This bay window forms a kind of apse at one end of the house, with beautiful views across the Sound of Harris, towards North Uist. Only the best would do.

Image courtesy of John Maher

An Extraordinary Project

We often design and create complex curtain poles, but this particular project had a whole set of unique challenges.

The window itself is made from six panes of glass, with four small and three larger pillars next to them. The pole needed to be 10 meters in length and go behind some of the pillars, as well as avoiding some lights.

To make things even more interesting, we only had some of the measurements. Luckily though, we had enough information to plot the exact location of the window and pillars using our specialised software.

Once we’d created a computer model we plotted a full scale drawing on paper, allowing us to see a representation of the bay in all its glory. This was particularly useful as we couldn't visit the house ourselves – as much as we would have liked to!

Next, we had to choose a suitable product for the task. We settled on the Silent Gliss 6130 hand drawn curtain track . This had the advantage that we could fix brackets to the front and back of the track, allowing us to use all the pillars for support without anything getting in the way of the curtains. We also made sure the angle of the bends wouldn’t affect the way the curtain moved along the track.

Once we’d made the pole, we packaged it carefully using a custom-made wooden frame, and it made its way to Scotland.

The pole and curtains look fantastic in their new setting, with the Sound of Harris beyond.

If you have a window with a special view and you’d like the perfect curtain pole to frame it, get in touch today.