Heritage project

Sheers on Carved Pelmets, Traditional Goan House

South Goa

A traditional Goan house with its original timber French doors, small-paned glazing and external grilles still in place. The rooms carry decorative plaster cornices and carved dark-wood furniture, and the floor is polished pale tile — the kind of interior where a heavy treatment would fight everything around it.

Property type: Portuguese Heritage House
Location: South Goa
Work done: Sheer Curtains, Hardware, Curtains

Ivory sheer curtains tied back on a carved hardwood pelmet above timber French doors in a traditional Goan house

The details

The Decisions That Mattered

The answer here was almost the lightest thing possible: unlined ivory sheers, hung from carved hardwood pelmets with turned finials and a carved centre motif, sitting above the door frame rather than inside it.

The doors work normally, the original joinery and cornice stay visible, and the room keeps its daylight while losing the glare.

Detail of a carved hardwood curtain pelmet with turned finials above a timber French door

01Pelmet above the opening, not inside itThe pelmet is face-fixed above the door head and runs wider than the opening on both sides. That keeps the full width of the French doors usable, lets the doors swing without touching fabric, and means the curtains stack onto wall rather than over glass.
02Timber hardware rather than metalA carved hardwood pelmet suits this building in a way a metal track does not, and it sidesteps the corrosion problem that untreated metal has in Goan air. It also carries the load through a single fixed rail rather than individual brackets, which is kinder to old masonry.
03Sheers alone, no liningThe glazing is divided into small panes with grilles beyond, so the light arriving is already broken up. An unlined sheer softens it further without darkening the room, and it keeps the view of the balcony and greenery that the doors were built to give.
04Tiebacks rather than a full drawBoth panels are dressed back against the reveal and held with fabric tiebacks. On a door that is used daily this keeps the opening clear and the fabric out of the traffic route, which is also what keeps hems clean.