Who is excited for another DIY?! I must have gotten a little DIY kick recently because I’m bringing another post to you centered around these DIY curtain rods I made. They were super simple to do and exactly what I was looking for. In our bedroom we have one small window by itself, and then another set of two small windows next to each other. We had a metal curtain rod that I bought awhile back from Home Goods, but the middle bracket was just annoying me so much! So I decided to spruce the room up with some DIY!
I knew that I wanted to try and use corbels of some type, but I just couldn’t decide which ones. I decided to take to Pinterest to get some inspiration, and I found something similar to the ones I made. As soon as I saw the photo I knew exactly what I wanted to do.
First things first, corbels are a tad pricey so it took me a little while to find some decently priced ones. I wish we could make them from scratch, but we just aren’t at that point yet (maybe one day when I have a “she-shed” I’ll make some!). For real a she-shed would be soooo amazing!!! I need one…when we have a farm…with horses and goats.
Anywho back to the corbels. I of course ended up finding the “ones” online after searching at the local hardware stores. I’ve linked them here below, and although they were still a little expensive (about $10), they were so worth it! I’ve linked some other ones that were similar to what I bought also.
One thing to keep in mind if you do decide to use corbels as curtain rod holders: the hole that you have to drill out of the wood. The wood needs to have enough room for your rod size to lay flush with it. What I did was bought the solid corbel, found my curtain rings, then went and bought my wood dowels which were a hair smaller than the rings. I decided to go with the 1.26″ curtains rings and a 3/4″ wooden dowel. You can certainly do bigger or smaller if you like, this is just the size that I preferred to use.
In order to carve out the hole for the dowel, we used our Dewalt Cordless Drill and bought a hole saw that worked perfectly. Here is the exact one we bought if you plan to use the same measurements that I did.
If you are planning on using some different tools or measurements, I would recommend test fitting things to be sure things fit. I always walk into Home Depot with my items and measure things so I don’t have to make multiple trips (Lord knows we still make tonsss of trips to that place). A quick side note on that: the Home Depot employees remember us and are always asking what we are doing next. I actually found out the Home Depot we go to is the largest one in Omaha also…so it’s slightly sad that multiple employees remember our faces haha! But hey, we like to do things ourselves!
Once we cut the holes in the corbels, I was able to stain the edges to help give them a rustic finish in the end. I saw this trick online and thought I would give it a shot! I just used some simple foam brushes and some Dark Walnut stain. You can really use any dark stain you’d like, but we had some Dark Walnut stain lying around from previous projects so that’s what I decided to use. Honestly, Dark Walnut is the perfect stain to have around anyway to add rustic touches and I highly recommend it! I’ve linked the exact kind we use below.
I did this to all of the corbels, and completely stained the wood dowels. They all dried very quickly! When you only do one layer of stain in a small area, it doesn’t take much time for them to dry. Simply rub your finger across the area and if no stain comes up, you are good to go for the next step.
I used the Magnolia Chalk Paint again for this project, and let me tell you: FLAWLESS. For real. This project the chalk paint did wonders! I added the chalk paint to the corbels, let them dry, then added a second coat to them. I added the second coat primarily because you could still see the lines of the stain, so the second coat was perfect. One thing to note, I completely covered these corbels in the chalk paint so you could not see the stain anymore on purpose. The stain is only meant to give the rustic look in the end.
I of course forgot to take a photo of the corbels completely painted, but in this photo you can kind of see them drying in the background. I also lightly painted the wood dowels to give them the look of rustic wood. Again, this chalk paint dried very quickly, so I only had to wait about 10 minutes with the fan on them between coats. I used the Magnolia Home Shiplap Chalk Paint on these corbels (the same as my antique door). ThenI finished the corbels with the clear wax as well.
Before I put the clear wax on though, I actually took sandpaper to the edges to give the rustic look. I did this to every single edge on the corbel also, not just the sides. You can see in the design I used they had some curves and other edges, so I sanded those as well. Once I was finished sanding them, I applied the clear coat of wax to both the corbels and the wood dowels.
Alright so once I got the corbels and wood dowels all done, I was able to move them inside and get them hung up on the walls! AJ helped me on this part to make sure they were even and what not. We have the basic white blinds in our rooms, so had to make sure they were spaced far enough away from those.
Once those were on the wall, it was time to hang my tablecloths for curtains! I got this idea from my friend Amanda, who saw them online from another home decor account. It was such a great idea to use tablecloths because I really wanted the drop cloth curtain look, but just don’t like the color of regular drop clothes. We have more bright whites in our house, so I wanted to use something brighter.
I chose some ivory tablecloths and they were PERFECT! Seriously I love how they turned out, and they brighten up our room so much! I paired them with some black curtain rings, and I’ve linked the materials I used below.
I would say I was able to spend roughly the same amount on these curtain rods as you would at the store for some cheaper looking rods, and these were so much higher quality! With using the tablecloths, the wood dowels, and the corbels, it has made this room look more custom and unique. Here are some close ups on how the corbels and curtains look in our bedroom all finished!
I really hope you’ve all enjoyed this DIY and can implement it into your home! It was certainly a fun project, and not hard by any means. Please always be sure to use caution and take safety steps when using any machinery while doing DIY projects. AJ and I are always very careful whenever using our tools.
If you have some fun DIY stories or plan to incorporate this look into your home, I would love to hear more and see what you do! If you have any questions on the process, please feel free to comment below and I would be happy to answer them. Thank you all for reading along!
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