Cologne 2013: French designers Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec have come up with a DIY kit for making curtains using a hanging cord that winds up like a guitar string.

Launching at trade fair imm cologne this week, Ready Made Curtain is a collaboration between Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec and Danish textile manufacturer Kvadrat.

The curtain is designed as a flexible hanging system that users can adapt to fit any window.

The kit comprises a hanging cord, wall fixings, pegs and your choice of Kvadrat textiles.

The hanging cord can be adjusted to fit any width of window using its winding mechanism, which the designers say was inspired by the tension in a guitar string.

The cord can be wound tighter when needed in order to maintain the right length and tension, and is easily transferable to another window.

"Little skill and few tools are needed, margin for error has been considered and perfection isn’t an absolute requirement," Ronan and Erwan Bourourllec explain. "In fact, the charm of the imperfect in opposition to the overly sanitised interior is something we believe in."

The curtain is available in a lightweight, semi-transparent fabric and a woollen fabric, both of which come in three colours. There's also a variety of colours for the winding mechanism, cord and pegs.

We've featured several projects by Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec, including a collection of cutlery for Alessi and a range of wooden furniture for a Danish university – see all our stories about the Bouroullecs.

Dezeen also featured a huge purple curtain installed as a room divider at the Venice Architecture Biennale last year.

Above: movie of Ready Made Curtain

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Here's some more information from the designers:

Kvadrat and designers Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec have come together to solve the challenges posed by a little explored area of domestic interior architecture: the curtain. The result is Ready Made Curtain, an original and simple hanging system to suit every window. Kvadrat’s first direct to consumer product will launch at the IMM in Cologne, January 2013.

Above: image from research process

The Ready Made Curtain is the culmination of Kvadrat’s lengthy research into the world of the domestic curtain. Working with ReD Associates, an innovation and strategy consultancy firm, Kvadrat started by investigating existing curtain solutions and comparing them to the requirements of the homeowner. Based on their findings, Kvadrat approached Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec to create Ready Made Curtain a simple yet novel approach for consumers to introduce high quality curtains to their home.

Above: image from research process

The Ready Made Curtain requires the participation of the owner in its making. Everything one needs to fix the curtain is provided: a hanging cord, wall fixings, pegs, and a selection of Kvadrat textiles.

Above: image from research process

"The ambition was to create a new system that allows anyone to install a quality curtain in record time. Little skill and few tools are needed, margin for error has been considered and perfection isn’t an absolute requirement. In fact, the charm of the imperfect in opposition to the overly sanitised interior, is something we believe in," note Ronan and Erwan Bouroullec.

Above: image from research process

The mechanics of the new hanging system have been refined over and over again by the designers until the absolute minimum required material and skill were achieved. This is a purposefully elementary product. The process of installation is straightforward as well. "We wanted to escape a hi-tech situation but we didn’t want to make something rustic or heavy either. We reflected on the popular method of fixing a poster to a wall, just simply with a staple." Similarly, Ready Made Curtain is an enjoyably effortless method of fixing fabric to a window.

Above: image from research process

The ingenuity of the hanging cord – a replacement for the traditional curtain pole – is found in the winding mechanism that enables it to fit any window: "The starting point was a picture in a Japanese book from the fifties. The book was a catalogue of objects and in it was a guitar. From there, we began to explore the system of string tension in guitars.” The cord is an efficient and elegant solution to hanging a curtain. It can be rewound when need be, in order to maintain the right tension, and is easily transferable from window to window.

Anders Byriel, CEO Kvadrat, adds: "A curtain is, we believe, much more than something to keep light out and privacy in – a curtain offers the opportunity to control light and create or completely change the atmosphere in a room." To that end, Ready Made Curtain is available in two different Kvadrat fabrics: a light, semi-transparent fabric or a woolen textile. Both are available in three different colourways and, in turn, a different colour palette of the mechanism, cord and pegs.

Above: image from research process

Ready Made Curtain is an evolution of previous collaborations between the Bouroullecs and Kvadrat in that it offers the customer the opportunity to adapt, change and enhance their interior through the use of textile. "One of the ambitions of our work with Kvadrat is to bring more fabric into interiors. The difference between this and previous products, such as Clouds and North Tiles, is that here we chose not to do any intervention on the fabric. The system is very simple, we have used the lightest touch."