curtain for a small alcove window

[annierose]

Hello knowledgeable folk! I am going to make curtains for my son's new house as a house-warming gift.
Pretty straightforward apart from 2 bedrooms (one of which he & partner sleep in). The windows are in a deep-set (about .5m) alcove with a sloping 'roof' (slopes from wall / ceiling corner down to window). The window occupies the whole alcove and is about 1.2m square, and there is no wall between the top of the alcove and ceiling.
They dislike blinds, which would be an obvious solution. Because of shift work they want heavy / 1 pass lined curtains.
It is obvious to me that the curtains should be mounted 'outside' the alcove (ceiling mounted track or pole on a wooden batten) and fall as far below the sill as they like.
However (why do house builders do this?) the radiator is immediately below the window and comes pretty well up to the sill. So to avoid the heat going up under the curtains and disappearing out of the window (!) I think I have 2 options:
Be very careful to let the curtains hang before I hem them and get them just brushing the sill (arrgghhh!)
OR their preferred option:
a ceiling mounted track inside the alcove with curtains fitting exactly (also arrgghh!) but with heavy / well lined curtains I think that the stack-back will cut out too much light.
All suggestions gratefully received!

[Greybird]

If the curtains are to be heavy they definitely won't draw back far enough not to cut out the light. I am having difficulty picturing where the slopes are - I am assuming this is a dormer window protruding from a sloping ceiling/wall? What I would do is to hang the curtains loosely slotted onto a pole above the window and equally loosely slotted at the bottom onto a second pole fixed below the window. I have also seen it done with the curtains just looped behind the lower pole.Hope this helps!

[BlueCat]

How about a ‘swing arm’ curtain pole that swings round (90degrees) to cover the window?

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=dormer+window+curtains+that+fold+back&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-gb&client=safari#imgrc=eO3wuE4lmPtfiM

(Sorry, can’t post a pic of it)

[BrendaP]

If I have envisioned the wondow correctly that's what I was going to suggest, or maybe a pair of swing arms.  You will need sturdy hinges and likely a support for the free ends of the arms to rest on.

[Ouryve]

You would have to hope there is something in the ceiling above the window that can hold the weight of the curtains and track or pole if that is what they want. This is why we still have ugly blinds in the other front room because there is nowhere on the wall of the bay window to mount a curtain track and we're not sure the ceiling can support it.

[Ploshkin]

But blinds don't have to be ugly.  I've got Roman blinds in a narrow window made in the same fabric as the other windows

[Ouryve]

These ones are! Horrible dark wood ones in a North facing room. 5 tall narrow panes, all at an angle to each other and two of them are awful tilt and turn ones that limit what we can put over them. Facing a main road so need some privacy but too much condensation to contemplate the bottom up type. Need to see out when waiting for school transport, though.


They're on the deal with it when we have the mental energy part of the list.

[annierose]

Thank you all - real food for thought!
They don't like blinds because they sleep with the window cracked open for most of the year, and say that from experience, a blind gets blown about and rattles. They also say that light seeps round the edge of a blind.
Swing arms are new to me (well, I must have seen them on the odd occasion, but taken no notice!) and I think that might be the answer. I need to check measurements.
A car breakdown prevented me from seeing the house myself, and the photos are not good. I am glad that I checked in with you as I can now go to look with these ideas in mind.

It is not a conventional dormer window, although that might have been the best way to describe it from the inside. One good thing is that the spare room has the same set up, so I can experiment with cheaper fabric (possibly even some of my remnants).

Thank you all, and I will let you know what gets decided, although distance and family commitments mean it won't be soon!