Net curtains

Net Curtains

"The original point of net curtains was to stop prying eyes looking in to your house if you had little or no garden. At the same time, because of their diaphanous, lacy texture they didn’t stop the light from entering. Genius.

What they are famous for, of course, is the fact that you can look OUT without being seen. Net curtains have come to be a symbol of suburban pretension and hypocrisy: coyly hiding our business behind them whilst actively sticking our nose into other people’s. We have been accused of being a nation of “curtain twitchers” and the net curtain is the main weapon in our armoury. Their supremacy is now under threat, however. 69% of people who do not have net curtains say it is because “they don’t like them”, and 42% because they are unfashionable. The decline in net curtain coverage has proved a success with burglars who find it easier to decide which houses to rob, but less so with the nation’s pet parrots who frequently bang their heads trying to fly through unadorned windows."

http://www.icons.org.uk/nom/nominations/netcurtains