The first curtains I hung on my French doors lasted eleven days.
They looked great in the photo.
A long white pair on a wall rod, high and wide, the way every pin says to hang them.
Then I opened the doors to let Biscuit out, and the left door shoved the whole curtain stack into a crumpled wad against the wall.
The right one caught the rod’s finial on the way.
Every single time.
By the second week I was opening the doors with one hand and holding the fabric back with the other, coffee in my teeth, which is not a look.
Turns out French doors aren’t windows with handles.
They move, they have a knob or lever sticking out right where a blind wants to go, and the glass usually sits almost flush in a frame with no depth to mount anything inside.
So the trick isn’t picking the prettiest fabric.
It’s picking something that moves with the door, or gets completely out of its way.
Here’s what works, what I’d skip, and the few measurements that decide it.
First, Which Way Do Your Doors Swing?
Go open your doors right now.
Do they swing into the room, or out toward the patio?
That one question sorts out most of this.
The curtain maker Three Girls puts it plainly: an in-swing door is the tricky one, because it runs into a curtain stack or a rod’s finials mounted on the wall around it.
That’s exactly what happened to me.
An out-swing door opens away from the room, so the wall around it is yours to dress however you like.
If your doors swing in and you use them every day, put the treatment on the door itself.
It rides along when the door opens and never gets in the way.
If they swing out, or you hardly ever open them, a wall rod with real curtains is back on the table.
And if you rent, or you just can’t face drilling into a door, frosted film might be your answer.
More on all three below.
Door-Mounted Shades: Slim Enough to Clear the Handle
The handle is the whole problem with blinds on a door.
It sticks out between the glass and the path the blind has to travel, so a chunky blind bumps it going up and down, and you scrape your knuckles on the slats every time you grab the lever.
3 Day Blinds’ French door guide says the treatments that clear it are the slim ones: 1-inch aluminum mini blinds, roller shades and cellular shades, because their headrails sit close to the glass.
Cellular shades with small cells, 3/8 or 1/2 inch, stay slim enough.
What they warn against is anything bulky, like big valances or wood and faux wood blinds with slats wider than 2 inches.
Those add depth that hits the handle, the trim, or the wall.
A few details from the same guide that I wish I’d known before my first order:
- Mount it outside the glass, on the door. The glass sits almost flush with the frame, so an inside mount rarely has room. Screws go into the door frame around the glass, never near the glass itself.
- Go wider than the glass. They suggest adding 2 to 3 inches on each side so light doesn’t leak around the edges.
- Check the stiles. Most French door stiles (the wood strips around the glass) are 4 to 6 inches wide, which is the room you have for brackets.
- Still hitting the handle? Extension brackets push the headrail out from the door, usually 1 to 3 inches.
Honestly, my favorite of the three is a light-filtering cellular shade.
It softens the glare without making the room a cave, and when it’s up it’s barely there.
Hold-Down Brackets Are the Part Everyone Skips
Here’s the bit nobody mentions on the product photo.
A shade hanging free on a door swings every time the door moves.
It slaps the glass, loosens its own hardware, and chips the paint on the door over time.
Hold-down brackets fix that.
They’re two tiny clips screwed to the door near the bottom of the glass, and the shade’s bottom rail pops into them, so the shade moves with the door instead of flapping against it.
Port and Bay’s measuring guide says most blind makers include them for door blinds.
3 Day Blinds says skip them only for a light roller shade that won’t swing much, a door you barely open, or a spot where drilling would wreck the weatherstripping.
On a wide shade on a door that gets slammed a lot, they suggest a second bracket near each end of the rail.
One thing to plan for: the bracket needs its own space below the glass.
Port and Bay recommends setting brackets for door blinds at least 2 inches out past the glass on every side.
Measure that strip of door before you order, not after.
Ask me how I know.
Sash Curtains: Two Skinny Rods and Some Sheer Fabric
If you want fabric instead of a shade, this is the old-school fix, and it’s the one I ended up with on my in-swing doors.
A sash curtain is a panel stretched between two thin rods mounted right on the door, one just above the glass and one just below.
The curtain is pinned at both ends, so it can’t swing, and it travels with the door like it’s part of it.
Drapery Rods Direct’s guide gives the sizing.
For a rod-pocket panel, go double the width of the glass for a soft, gathered look, and three times the width if it’s a sheer.
Brackets go just above and below the outside corners of the glass.
The panel needs to be several inches longer than the glass too, to wrap the rods and any molding around the glass.
Two warnings from Three Girls that I’d underline.
Keep the fabric light, because a heavy curtain on a door is weight on the hinges.
And watch out for shrinking.
A sash curtain is fitted between two fixed rods, so if it shrinks in the wash it won’t reach the bottom rod anymore.
I wash mine on cold and hang them back on the rods damp, which pulls them straight as they dry.
Want a little shape?
Cinch each panel in the middle with a ribbon for the hourglass look.
Mine came from a thrift store lace tablecloth, cut in half and hemmed into rod pockets on a weekend afternoon.
If you love that vintage lace look, I rounded up more of it in my lace curtain ideas.
Curtains on the Wall Work Best on Out-Swing Doors
Now for the long, dreamy curtains, which do have a place.
It’s just usually on doors that swing out.
The whole game here is stacking width, meaning the wall space the curtains bunch into when they’re open.
Hunker’s guide says a rod should run at least 3 or 4 inches past a window on each side, and that a rod about one-third wider than the window leaves room for the stack.
For a French door it says to allow extra, so you can push the curtains completely clear of the doorway.
Heavy, lined curtains need more room than thin ones.
I worked out my own rod height and width with the same math I used in how high to hang a curtain rod.
If your doors swing in and you still want full curtains, look at a portiere rod.
Three Girls describes it as a hinged rod that swings like a gate with the door, so you can park the curtain open against the wall or swing it closed across the doorway.
It’s a niche piece of hardware, but it beats wrestling the fabric every morning like I did.
Frosted Film for Renters (and Bathrooms)
If you’re in a rental, or the doors face a neighbor’s window ten feet away, frosted film is the cheapest privacy there is.
The static cling kind has no glue at all.
Purlfrost says theirs goes on with static, comes off easily and can be reused if you store it right, which makes it a good fit for rented places.
Frosted film also blocks the view day and night while letting most of the light through, which a shade can’t do once it’s down.
The catch?
You can’t open it.
3 Day Blinds points out that film can’t be adjusted through the day, and it can peel, bubble or fade over time, especially on glass that isn’t perfectly smooth.
And if your doors have lots of little panes, you’re cutting a separate piece for every single one.
On my friend’s doors that was 15 panes a side, and it took us a whole Saturday and a pot of coffee.
I’d use film on a bathroom door or a street-facing door where you want privacy all the time, and pick a shade or sash curtain anywhere you want to see out sometimes.
My Setup Now, and What I’d Do on a Budget
Here’s where my doors landed after a year of trial and error.
Sheer sash curtains on both doors for everyday privacy, and the original long curtains moved to a much wider rod so they stack fully off the door frame.
They’re mostly decoration now.
Three Girls actually suggests that combo, sheer sash curtains on the door with a heavier set on the wall, as a way to layer light control.
If you’re doing this on a budget, start with the cheapest fix for your door’s swing:
- In-swing, used daily: sash rods and a sheer panel. Thrift a lace or voile panel and you’re mostly paying for the rods.
- In-swing, need it dark: a slim cellular or roller shade on each door, with hold-down brackets.
- Out-swing: long curtains on a rod wide enough for the stack. Check Facebook Marketplace for curtain rods, people sell them all the time when they move.
- Renting: static cling film now, and take it with you when you go.
And whatever you pick, open and close the doors a dozen times before you call it done.
That’s the test my first curtains failed.
If you’ve got sliding doors on the other side of the house, I covered those separately in my sliding glass door window treatments, because they’re a whole different animal.
Related read: Things I Wish I Knew Before I Decorated My First Home — Instant PDF + Kindle download. Secure checkout by Stripe