Hay Interiors has worked with Perth’s design community for around twenty years. Most of that work is residential – the kind of house where the window treatments were considered at the same time as everything else, and where a curtain that is nearly right is not right.
You deal with Annie, who measures, specifies and is responsible for the result. There is no salesperson in between, and nothing is sent interstate to be made. Curtains and Roman blinds are cut and sewn in the Nedlands workroom, which is also why a problem can be dealt with rather than lodged with a supplier.
“For the past 18 years I have worked exclusively with Annie for all my clients’ drapery needs — commercial and residential, single rooms through to entire buildings.“
— Perth interior designer, 20 years in practice
Designers work in very different ways, and we have not found one that does not suit us.
Some want us to source the fabric and take a margin on it. Some prefer a percentage arrangement on the job. Some want neither, and simply want the work done properly and invoiced.
The same goes for the client relationship. Some designers introduce us directly and are happy for the client to know who made the curtains. Others would rather we stayed invisible. We do, and we do not approach your client afterwards.
If you have already specified a fabric, we will work to it.
Whatever the arrangement, it is agreed before the job starts, and it does not change partway through.
Earlier this year Hay Interiors was invited to propose window dressings for a suite at Parliament House in Perth. The brief asked for a design that would make the rooms feel lighter, brighter, more inviting and more cohesive, while respecting the heritage architecture. Annie submitted a proposal and design, and it was accepted.
The interesting part was that those two requirements pull against each other. The conventional answer at a heritage window of that height is a pelmet or swags and tails, both of which weight the top of the opening and take light out of the room. Annie proposed a hand painted rod instead, leaving the head of the window open, and kept the traditional detail where it belonged – a triple pinch pleat at two and a half times the track width, with the heading made deeper than standard because the curtains are tall.
It is a useful illustration of what she brings to a scheme. Not a preference for traditional or contemporary, but a judgement about which elements a particular room needs and which it is better without.
The curtains were made in our Nedlands workroom and installed on site.
The Montauk Lighting Co needed the end of a long corridor in their Perth showroom dressed. The width ruled out curtains, and the designers came to us with Roman blinds in mind – the sensible answer, and the one most workrooms would simply have quoted.
Annie went through the Roman options with them and none of them did what the space needed. A flat or soft Roman at the end of a corridor reads as a window covering and nothing more, and this was a corridor that wanted an event at the end of it. She proposed an Austrian blind instead – unfamiliar to the designers, who had not specified one before, but the right shape for a narrow opening meant to be looked at rather than looked through, and the treatment that would show the Ralph Lauren Home velvet they had chosen at its best. They looked at photographs and agreed to it.
This is the part of the relationship designers tend to value most. Annie will quote what you specify, but if she thinks the specification is wrong she will say so at the drawing stage rather than at installation, and she will bring an alternative rather than an objection.
Annie can advise on the most suitable curtains and blinds at the design stage, working from architectural drawings before a window physically exists. Getting the window treatment right on paper — proportion, heading, stack, track type, motorisation provisions — saves costly changes later and keeps your scheme coherent. It’s the kind of upfront, technical input a retail showroom simply cannot provide.
“I consistently receive excellent upfront advice from Annie, which greatly assists in guiding design and specification decisions. She always anticipates potential issues while offering effective solutions.“
— Director, Perth interior design practice, 15 years working with Hay Interiors
For architects, the value of involving a curtain workroom early is less about fabric and more about provisions. Ceiling recesses for concealed tracks, pelmet boxes that sit correctly within the cornice detail, power provisions for motorised curtains run before plastering, and stack-back allowances that keep glazing clear when curtains are open — these decisions are easy on the drawing board and costly to retrofit.
Annie is comfortable reading architectural drawings and advising at documentation stage, so window treatments are integrated into the design rather than applied to it afterwards. On new builds and significant renovations, a short conversation at design stage routinely saves clients thousands in avoided rework — and produces a cleaner architectural result, with tracks recessed, hardware concealed and proportions respected. Whether the project then flows through an interior designer, the builder or the client directly, the provisions are right from the start.
Everything is made in the Nedlands workroom, a few minutes from most of the suburbs we work in. If a drop is not sitting right, or a client changes their mind about a tieback, it is dealt with here. There is no supplier to lodge it with and no interstate freight either way.
We are not tied to one brand. We work across several distributors and fabric ranges, including specialist heritage sources, so a fabric you have specified can usually be got, and where it cannot we will say so early and suggest alternatives rather than substitute quietly.
Fabric delivery is almost always what sets the timing, not the making. That is the argument for talking to us at drawing stage rather than when the house is nearly finished. We give honest lead times, including the ones you will not like.
The most useful first meeting is usually in the workroom. You can see how the blinds are built rather than take our word for it, go through the fabric library, and talk through a live project or one still at drawing stage.
Annie will tell you honestly what a treatment will look like when it is made, what a fabric will do at the size you are proposing, and where a specification will cause trouble on site. If something in your scheme will not work, you will hear it at the meeting rather than at installation.
If it is easier, she will come to you, or to the site.
Yes. Terms are agreed designer by designer rather than set by a programme, because designers work in very different ways and we would rather fit in with yours than ask you to change it. Annie will talk through what suits before any work starts, and once it is agreed it does not change partway through a job.
Yes — Annie can specify suitable curtains and blinds from drawings at the design stage, which helps avoid costly changes and keeps the scheme consistent.
Lead times are driven mainly by fabric delivery rather than the making. Engaging early, even at the drawing stage, keeps projects on schedule, and Annie provides an honest timeline up front.
We install. The same team that measures and makes also fits, so there is no handover in the middle where responsibility becomes unclear. On a site with a builder or other trades involved, Annie will coordinate timing directly rather than leaving it with you.
Not unless you ask us to. We know that where you have your curtains made is part of how your practice competes, and we treat it as yours to disclose rather than ours.
