Bedroom Curtains and Decor
Your curtains hang on a legally required escape route. Here is the geometry that decides what you can mount, and what nobody prices.
Your curtains hang on a legally required escape route
Every sleeping room must have at least one operable window or exterior door approved for emergency escape or rescue1. That window needs a minimum net clear opening of 5.7 square feet, a minimum net clear opening height of 24 inches, a minimum width of 20 inches, and a sill no more than 44 inches above the floor1. Whatever you hang on it has to leave all of that working.
Here is the part almost every article gets wrong. Those three minimums cannot be satisfied independently. A window that is exactly 20 inches wide and exactly 24 inches high gives you 3.33 square feet, not 5.7. Nashua's own compliance table proves it: a 20 inch width needs 41 inches of height, 24 inches needs 34 1/4, 30 inches needs 27 3/8, and 34 inches needs 24 1/81.
Which is good news for decor. The escape window is larger than the minimums imply, so measure the real opening before buying a rod, a blind or a shade. And note the operating rule: the unit must open from inside to a full clear opening without separate tools1.
Six constraints worth knowing before you mount anything
Every rule below comes from a municipal handout you can read yourself.
The opening you are dressing
A bedroom escape window needs 5.7 square feet of net clear opening, at least 24 inches high and 20 inches wide, with a sill no higher than 44 inches1. Measure the sash opening, not the trim. Rod length and blind width follow from the real number.
The minimums do not add up
Twenty inches by 24 inches is 3.33 square feet, well short of 5.7. Nashua's published table pairs the dimensions: 20 inches wide needs 41 tall, 24 needs 34 1/4, 30 needs 27 3/8, 34 needs 24 1/81. Your window is bigger than the minimums suggest.
Grade floor windows are different
Nashua publishes one exception: a grade floor window may have a minimum net clear opening of 5 square feet rather than 5.71. Smaller opening, same operating rules. Know which kind you have before you assume the two windows in a house behave alike.
No tools, ever
The escape unit must be operable from the inside to a full clear opening without the use of separate tools1. A fixed shutter, a screwed-in valance or a treatment that has to be unclipped defeats that. Anything mounted must clear the sash through its full travel.
Lamps can replace the ceiling light
NEC 210.70(A) requires at least one listed wall-mounted control device controlling a lighting outlet in every habitable room, near the entrance. In rooms other than kitchens, laundries and bathrooms, a receptacle controlled by that device is permitted2. That is the code basis for a switched bedside outlet.
A light fixture is an outlet
The Saint Paul arc-fault handout counts luminaires, meaning light fixtures, and smoke detectors as outlets alongside receptacles3. Since NEC 210.12(B) names bedrooms, closets and hallways, changing a fixture in those spaces is electrical work under the 2023 code, not decorating3.
What does it cost?
We could not verify a single price for curtains, blinds, shades or decorative hardware. No government body, trade association or manufacturer we reached publishes one with a method behind it, and the numbers circulating under headings like average window treatment cost trace to lead-generation aggregators. We will not reprint one. What we can tell you is that the input driving the price, the size of the opening, is knowable exactly, because the code geometry above tells you what a compliant bedroom window has to measure1. Measure yours, then price against that.
Where a decor project does acquire a labor cost is electrical. If a bedside lamp is getting a switched receptacle under NEC 210.70(A)2, or a light fixture is being changed and therefore triggering arc-fault protection under the 2023 code3, that is an electrician. The 2025 OEWS estimates put electricians at a national median of $30.38 an hour and an annual median of $63,1904. If walls are being painted or papered first, painters had a median of $23.75 an hour5. Both are wages paid to employees, not billed rates, and a contractor's price has to carry overhead on top.
The window dimensions come from one city's handout reproducing the 2018 IRC; the wages are national 2025 OEWS estimates of pay to employees, not billed rates; no curtain, blind or shade price appears because none could be verified.
How to hire for curtains and bedroom decor
Who does the work
For treatments, an installer or you, since mounting hardware is not licensed work. An electrician the moment a fixture is swapped or a switched receptacle is added, at a national median of $30.38 an hour and an annual median of $63,190 in the 2025 OEWS estimates4. A painter first if walls are changing, at a median of $23.75 an hour5.
What pros will ask
The net clear opening of the escape window and its sill height above the floor, because the treatment has to leave both intact1. Whether the mount is inside or outside the casing. Whether the room has a hardwired interconnected smoke alarm that nothing may cover6. And whether you want a switched receptacle for a lamp rather than a ceiling fixture2.
What to check before signing
Confirm in writing that the finished treatment leaves the escape window operable to a full clear opening without separate tools1. Confirm no hardware crosses the sash travel. If a fixture is being changed, confirm arc-fault protection is priced in, since the 2023 code counts luminaires as outlets in bedrooms3. And reject any quote resting on an industry average price for window treatments.
Related searches homeowners make
Pulled from the same demand data behind our Bedroom Design category.
Curtain and decor questions, answered straight
Can I put fixed shutters or a mounted valance on a bedroom window?
Only if the window still works without tools. The escape unit in a sleeping room must be operable from inside to a full clear opening without the use of separate tools1. A shutter that screws shut, a valance blocking the sash, or a treatment that must be unclipped before the window opens all defeat that, even though the window itself complies. Mount outside the casing, or choose hardware that clears the sash through its full travel.
How wide is my bedroom window likely to be?
Wider than the stated minimums, and that trips people up constantly. The rule is a 5.7 square foot net clear opening with a minimum height of 24 inches and a minimum width of 20 inches1. Those cannot all be met at once: 20 by 24 inches is only 3.33 square feet. Nashua's published table pairs them properly, showing that 20 inches of width needs 41 inches of height, 24 needs 34 1/4, 30 needs 27 3/8, and 34 needs 24 1/81. Measure the sash opening before buying a rod.
Is a basement bedroom window different from an upstairs one?
It can be. Nashua publishes an exception allowing a grade floor window a minimum net clear opening of 5 square feet instead of 5.71. The requirement also attaches per room: where a basement contains sleeping rooms, escape openings are required in each one but not in the adjoining basement areas1. So two windows in one house can carry different rules, and treatments sized for one may not suit the other.
Can I skip the ceiling light and use lamps instead?
Often yes, and the code allows it explicitly. NEC 210.70(A) requires at least one listed wall-mounted control device to control lighting outlets in every habitable room, installed near the entrance2. In rooms other than kitchens, laundries and bathrooms, a receptacle controlled by that wall-mounted device is permitted in place of a fixture2. That is the basis for a switched outlet feeding a bedside lamp. Have an electrician confirm the receptacle is actually switched, since an unswitched one does not satisfy it.
What should curtains or blinds cost?
We do not know, and we will not guess. No primary source we reached publishes window treatment pricing with a stated method, so every average you will see comes from an aggregator. That is a real gap in this guide rather than something to paper over. The practical path is to measure your own net clear opening, which the code geometry lets you predict closely1, then price the exact width and drop at retailers you would genuinely buy from. Compare sizes, not product names.
Where these facts came from
Every figure on this page was read out of the page linked below. We do not cite cost aggregators.
- City of Nashua, New Hampshire, 2018 IRC egress window handout
- City of Saint Paul, dwelling unit rough-in electrical checklist, NEC 210.70(A)
- City of Saint Paul, AFCI protection handout, 2023 NEC 210.12(B)
- BLS OEWS, electricians wages, 2025 annual estimates
- BLS OEWS, painters in construction and maintenance, 2025 annual estimates
- City of Saint Paul, basement finish handout, smoke and carbon monoxide alarms
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