How To Make Your Own
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Thermal shades can shave a lot of money off of the average home’s winter heating bills, but custom shades are pricey and custom thermal shades are even more expensive. The good news is, you can make your own homemade thermal shades easily and inexpensively, and you can do a good job of it even if you aren’t naturally gifted at crafts or at sewing. The materials are simple to find and inexpensive to buy, the seams are few, and any mistakes are mercifully covered over by draperies or curtains on either side.
To make your own thermal shades, you will need the following materials:
- Quilted fabric backed with fiberfill. This kind of cloth is sold in fabric stores everywhere for use in bedspreads and pillow shams, but it happens to also be perfect for thermal shades. Choose a print or subtle stripe that coordinates with your drapes; or, if you have print drapes, choose a coordinated solid color for your shades.
- Plain cotton batting. You can skip this layer if you wish. Adding additional batting to your shades simply increases the thermal insulation value.
- A plastic or Mylar thermal vapor barrier. This layer can be a 4ml plastic drop cloth cut to size (usually a dollar or less per cloth at home improvement stores), heavy plastic trash bags cut up, or plastic bubble wrap saved from packing boxes. For really high-tech thermal shades you can use Mylar, the material used in the kind of space age blankets carried by backpackers and campers, or found in snow emergency kits for the trunks of cars. Mylar is more expensive but has a reflective surface that keeps heat in.
- Plain cotton muslin. This forms the last outer layer facing the window.
- Velcro tape. This will hold the homemade thermal shade flush against the wall and keep the wind and cold out.
To make your own thermal shades, measure your windows and cut the quilted fabric, vapor barrier, additional batting (if used), and muslin to a size roughly three inches larger than your window opening.
Place the quilted fabric right side up on a table, then the vapor barrier right side down, then the extra batting, then finally the muslin, and pin the layers together all the way around the shade. (You are going to be turning all these layers inside out once you stitch the shade, so keep this in mind as you arrange the layers.)
On your sewing machine, choose a fairly long stitch and a heavy needle, and stitch through all the layers all the way around your shade, leaving the bottom edge open. Now turn the entire shade inside out, the way you would a pillowcase. Slipstitch the open end and then press the shade.
The final step is to attach the Velcro all the way around the edge of your window, and the matching half of the Velcro strip around the edge of the back of the shade. Now you have a functional thermal shade, and if you like you can get fancier by attaching snaps, buttons, or other bits of Velcro so you can fold the shade open for part of the time if you wish.
For more detailed instructions on how to make your own thermal shades, check out The Homemade Thermal Shade at Mother Jones Magazine.