Weiss and Sons in New York city is probably the premiere maker of theatre curtains today, since they have fabricated large and elaborate designs and is one of the few still having the rigging and large work areas to make most anything. Mid-West Scenic in Milwaukee also has done large theatre work, so any firm capable of the large scale work can probably do smaller stuff with ease. One can consult the listing in the Buyers Guide (December) issue of TCI (Theatre Crafts) magazine for a listing of such makers.
For those of you who want finer draperies, perhaps with tassels and trims, one should first contact a trimmings maker to locate suitable designs, since drapery makers do not make trimmings and are often not inclined to outsorce such a sub-contract, so drapers will often discourage you from trimmings unless they have a working relationship with such as Scalamandre, West Coast, Nyren, Conso, etc. Ideas for elaborate trimmings are available in the publication "Grand Drapes, Tormentors and Teasers" (tormetors and teasers are types of stage draperies) by the late Terry Helgesen, and is sold as the 1983 ANNUAL of the Theatre Historical Soc. of America on their web site link under ANNUALS:
www.HistoricTheatres.org Also see their BOOKSTORE link for many titles that may otherwise treat of theatre draperies. Great images are in "THE BEST REMAINING SEATS: The Story Of The Golden Age Of The Movie Palace" (especially page 150 with the KINGS in Brooklyn!) and in the book AMERICAN THEATRES OF TODAY by Sexton, 1930, which is available through Inter-Library loan through your local library. Click on the titles in their BOOKSTORE and you will be taken to Amazon.com to see reviews and to order if you like. Their ANNUAL of the MIDLAND Theater, Kansas City, shows a most lavish grand drapery upon the proscenium which may fascinate you, but be impossible to achieve today, and, likewise their ANNUAL on the NEW YORK PARAMOUNT THEATRE contains images of the very elaborate grand drapery, and if you can locate a copy of the book "FOX: THE LAST WORD" you will see the six story high draperies of that long-lost-to-us grand palace. Also the book: "Decorateive Draperies and Upholstery" by Ed. Thorne (1930) contains a chapter on Theatre Draperies and several photos, among which is a color plate of the huge draperies once in the New York PARAMOUNT. It an be found through Inter-Library loan at your local library.
Note that patrons today will readily attack any such ornamental draperies within reach! This is especially true of tassles and such ornaments when a guy's date says that she "would really like something like that" whereupon the guy feels like a cavalier and climbs up on the drapery to use a pocketknife to cut down something for her. Such has happened! Since large tassels are custom made , they cost hundreds of dollars each and are not easily replaced, so be sure any ornaments you choose are up quite high and out of reach by even the athletic ones!
The people of our day and age will not allow the decorations of the movie palaces, even if we can afford to replicate them, unless they are completely out of reach. If you must have draperies that reach the floor, either make them so strong that kids can climb them safely, or make the headings break-away so that if pulled upon they will promptly drop to the floor. This may seem too far fetched to those used to low ceiling multiplexes, but for those of you having taller ceilings, there may be existing or replacement draperies that WILL be climbed. Here in a movie palace in Milwaukee a group of negro kids were found swinging like monkeys from the 30-foot-high draperies framing the wall murals in the former WARNER and then grabing the fringes and descending by holding them and letting them rip away as they came to the floor. It was great fun! We found that the replacement costs along with the two-foot-long tassels which had been cut away, was over $10,000 per mural (there are six murals). Needless to say, the draperies were removed and not replaced. I would love to see the art form of grand draperies return, but I had the misfortune to be born into a much later and much crasser day.
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