The short answer: match the heading to the room and the wall
The heading is the top few centimetres of a curtain, and it does more work than its size suggests. Heading style affects how curtains fall, how they look and how compactly they stack when opened, according to Australian House & Garden's buyer's guide.
Our heading styles guide covers the four that suit nearly every home; this piece adds the rest and how each one stacks.
So the choice comes down to two questions. What sort of room is it? And how much wall is there beside the window for the curtain to sit against when it's open?
Here is how the main headings compare.
| Heading | How it looks and hangs | Suits |
|---|---|---|
| Pinch pleat | Two or three pinched folds about 100 mm from the top, with the bulk at the front. Looks spectacular on rods with rings.1 | Classic interiors |
| Euro pleat | The pinch sits at the top of the heading. Looks spectacular on rods with rings.1 | A more informal room, and large-scale patterns and prints |
| Pencil pleat | Heading tape sewn on and gathered by pulling a cord.1 | A relaxed, unstructured feel |
| S-fold or wave | No pleating: the fabric folds in an S in front of and behind the track, and needs more stacking room.1, 2 | Sleek, casual, contemporary rooms |
| Inverted box pleat | A tailored flat pleat with little bulk.1 | Traditional and contemporary homes |
| Stackless reverse pleat | A stack of 15 to 20% of the fabric required, against 25 to 30% for other pleats.3 | Wide windows, views, and little wall space beside the window |
At Curtains Newcastle, we'd settle the wall question first. A heading you love that blocks a third of your view when open is the wrong heading.
How each heading folds, seen from above
Look down on a curtain from the ceiling and each heading has its own shape. That shape carries all the way to the hem.
From the room side to the window side
A pinch pleat holds its folds in tight clusters. An S-fold snakes in front of and behind the track. A pencil pleat gathers into many small, close folds. An inverted box pleat stays almost flat. Once you can picture the plan view, the rest of this guide makes sense.
Pinch pleat curtain headings: the classic, tailored choice
A pinch pleat is the formal option. Australian House & Garden says the double or triple pinch suits classic interiors, with the bulk sitting at the front of the heading and two or three pinched folds about 100 mm from the top.
That structure gives you crisp, even columns of fabric. It suits a living room with a cornice and a fireplace, or a dining room you want to feel dressed. The same guide notes that pinch and euro pleats both look spectacular on rods with rings.
There are variations. A Luxaflex dealer lists single pinch, double pinch and triple pinch among its pleat options, alongside knife and reverse pleats. Luxaflex's dealer singles out the triple pinch for its tailored look.
Euro pleat: a softer pinch for big prints
A euro pleat is a pinch pleat with its collar loosened. Australian House & Garden describes it as an updated, more informal pinch pleat, with the pinch at the very top of the heading rather than lower down.
Because the fabric below the pinch falls open, a pattern reads clearly. The guide says it suits large-scale patterns and prints. If you've fallen for a bold botanical or a wide stripe, this is the heading that lets it show.
Pencil pleat curtain headings: gathered and relaxed
Pencil pleat is the most casual of the pleated headings. It is made by sewing heading tape onto a flat curtain and pulling the cord until it gathers, and the result has a much more relaxed, unstructured feel.
That softness is the point. Pencil pleat sits happily in bedrooms, spare rooms and cottages where crisp columns would feel stiff. It is less structured than a pinch pleat, so the folds sit softer rather than in crisp columns. Some people like that. If you want every fold to land in the same place, choose something more tailored.
Wave and S-fold curtain headings: clean, modern folds
S-fold, often called wave or s-wave, has no pleats at all. Australian House & Garden calls it sleek, casual and contemporary, with the fabric folding in an "S" in front of and behind the track.
Silent Gliss, the track maker, describes its Wave system as giving a more contemporary look throughout the curtain drop. The look carries the full drop, which is why wave suits sheers over big glass and view rooms, where a light fabric shows the curve.
The trade-off is space. S-fold tends to require more stacking room than other heading styles. More on that below.
Silent Gliss also makes a Swiss Pleat, a heading only it supplies, which it describes as an understated alternative to traditional curtain headings, with gliders sewn into the curtain. Our page on sheer curtains shows where a soft modern fold works well.
Eyelet headings: straight onto a pole
An eyelet heading hangs directly on a pole, with no hooks or gliders. It has rings set into the top of the fabric, and the pole threads through them. It gives deep, regular folds and a casual, modern feel. It's a good fit where you want a visible pole as part of the look. A Luxaflex dealer lists eyelet among its options.
Inverted box pleat: tailored with little bulk
An inverted box pleat is a flat, folded pleat rather than a gathered one. Australian House & Garden calls it a tailored flat pleat with little bulk, low-key and suited to both traditional and contemporary homes.
It's the one to consider when you want a neat finish without the drama of a pinch pleat. It also works where the curtain sits close to a wall or a piece of furniture and you don't want deep folds pushing out.
How much wall space your curtains need when open
Every curtain needs somewhere to go when it's open. That bundle of fabric is the stack, and it sits either against the wall beside the window or across the glass.
Most pleated headings stack wider than people expect. A Luxaflex dealer puts the stack for other pleated headings at 25 to 30% of the fabric required, and says the stackless reverse pleat cuts that to 15 to 20%.
Stack size as a share of fabric required
To make that concrete: take a set of curtains made from 4 metres of fabric width. At 25 to 30%, the stack is roughly 1 to 1.2 metres. At 15 to 20%, it's roughly 0.6 to 0.8 metres. That is our estimate, applying the dealer's percentages, and your own window's measure decides the real figure.
A Luxaflex dealer says the stackless reverse pleat suits wide windows and views, or places with very little wall space beside the window. If your sliding door opens to a deck you want to see, that difference matters.
Short of wall above the window too? Hidden or ceiling-mounted tracks create height and are practical where there is little or no wall space above a window or door. Our guide to tracks, rods and pelmets goes through the hardware side.
Where to mount the track or rod, and where the hem should land
The heading you pick looks best at the right height. A designer quoted by Australian House & Garden suggests that in older homes with lower ceilings, you fit rods just below the cornice to suggest height. In newer homes with higher ceilings, anywhere from just above the architrave up to the cornice works, but never below the architrave.
One designer quoted by Australian House & Garden suggests about 10mm off the floor for a neat look that holds its shape. Our own default is the kiss, where the hem just touches the floor; a puddle looks generous but collects dust on hard floors. A pinch pleat or wave curtain that stops just above the boards keeps its lines; one that pools loses them. For more on this, see how curtains should fall.
Headers and pelmets: stopping the light over the top
Even the best heading leaves a gap at the top if the track is exposed. A Luxaflex dealer says a header hides the rod or track and helps stop light leaking over the top of the curtain, and adds that it gives some insulation.
This matters most in a bedroom with blockout curtains and early sun, where a thin band of light along the ceiling defeats the point. Windows matter for comfort generally: Your Home says up to 40% of a home's heating energy can be lost through windows, and that blinds and curtains can be used to improve the thermal performance of your windows. With the Bureau's outlook issued 1 October giving over 80% chance of unusually warm days across most of NSW from October to December, a closed top is worth weighing for west and north rooms this spring.
If you're also choosing fabric, our curtain fabric guide and the page on lined drapes cover weight and light.
Corded curtains: what the national safety standard asks of installers
If your curtains will be drawn by a cord, Australia's mandatory safety standard, explained by the NSW Government, sets out how they must be installed. A loose cord cannot form a loop of 220mm or longer at or below 1,600 mm above the floor, and any cleat securing a cord must sit at least 1,600 mm above the floor.
- Installer's name and contact label attached
- Supplier warning labels and swing tags left on
- Continuous-loop cords that can't be cut need a safety device holding them out of reach
These are installation and labelling requirements on suppliers and installers. The installer must attach a label with their name and contact details, and supplier warning labels or swing tags must not be removed.
Cutting the cord loop is not always an option, because pull-cords on certain vertical blinds or curtains need a continuous loop and can't be cut and need a safety device that holds the cord out of reach instead.
Questions to settle before you choose
Run through these before you fall for a heading. Each one narrows the list.
- Pole with rings, or a track?
- How much wall is there beside the window for the stack?
- Is there wall above the window, or does it need a ceiling-mounted track?
- How heavy is the fabric, and is it a sheer?
- How often will you open and close them, and by hand or by cord?
- Pole or track? Pinch and euro pleats look good on rods with rings. S-fold sits in front of and behind a track. Eyelet goes straight onto a pole.
- How much wall beside the window? Little wall means planning the stack before anything else: we will tell you at the measure how much glass the open curtain will hold. Plenty of wall gives you every option, S-fold included.
- Is there wall above the window? If not, a ceiling-mounted track keeps the height.
- How heavy is the fabric? A heavy lined drape and a floaty sheer behave differently under the same heading. The drapery glossary helps with the terms.
- How often will you open them, and how? Curtains drawn daily by hand suit a smooth-running track. Cord-drawn curtains bring the safety rules above into play.
If you'd like to work through these at home first, the Fold & Fall Planner is on our site.
Numbers worth knowing before you choose
Getting the heading right for your windows
The heading is easiest to choose standing in the room, with the window and the wall beside it measured. If you're weighing pinch pleat against wave, or wondering whether your wall can take an S-fold stack, book a measure and quote with Curtains Newcastle through our enquiry page. Bring the questions above, and we'll work through them with you at the window. You can also browse our curtains and check the areas we visit.
Sources
- Australian House & Garden, buyer's guide to curtains and blinds: https://www.homestolove.com.au/decorating/buyers-guide-to-curtains-and-blinds-9777/
- A Luxaflex dealer, headers, pleats and finishing touches: https://rundleblinds.luxaflex.com.au/products/other-products/headers-pleats-finishing-touches
- Silent Gliss Australia, Wave curtains: https://www.silentgliss.com.au/enau/fabrics/fabric-expertise/wave-curtains/
- Silent Gliss Australia, Swiss Pleat curtains: https://www.silentgliss.com.au/enau/fabrics/fabric-expertise/swiss-pleat-curtains/
- NSW Government, blind and curtain safety: https://www.nsw.gov.au/legal-and-justice/consumer-rights-and-protection/safety/other-consumer-products/blind-and-curtain-safety
- Your Home, glazing: https://www.yourhome.gov.au/passive-design/glazing
- Bureau of Meteorology, climate outlook issued 1 October 2026: https://www.bom.gov.au/climate/ahead/outlooks/archive/20261001-outlook.shtml