Keeping Little Ones Safe: Our Window Blind Safety Guide
At Ideal Textiles, helping you create a beautiful family home is what we do best—and making sure that home is perfectly safe for your little ones is our absolute top priority.
We know how wonderfully curious children can be when exploring their surroundings. That is why every single blind we craft meets the very highest UK safety standards. This quick guide explains exactly what we do to keep your family safe, and the simple steps you can take at home.
🛡️ Our Safety Promise & UK Standards
- Rigorous Testing: All of our blinds are designed and manufactured with child safety at the very forefront. Every product is thoroughly tested to ensure it fully complies with the strict British and European safety standard (BS EN 13120).
- Built-In Protection: By UK law, any blind manufactured after February 2014 must meet specific safety requirements. Our blinds are either completely 'safe by design' (meaning they have no hanging cords at all) or they come supplied with fully compliant, rigorously tested safety devices.
✨ How Our Safety Features Work
Depending on the style of blind you choose, it will feature one of our clever, child-safe designs:
- Cordless Designs: The simplest safety feature of all! Some of our blinds operate completely without cords or chains, making them inherently safe for children's rooms.
- Breakaway Devices: For blinds that require cords, we use special breakaway tassels and consolidators. These clever little devices are designed to instantly pop apart under pressure, but are beautifully simple for an adult to clip back together.
- Cleats and Hooks: We supply a child-safety device with every corded or chained blind to keep the controls completely taut and out of reach. Wood, faux wood, and Venetian blinds come with a cord cleat, while our roller and Roman blinds include a safety tension hook.
🛠️ Fitting Your New Blinds
We supply a safety device with every single blind that needs one. It is absolutely mandatory to install this device when fitting your blind to comply with safety regulations. It only takes a moment, and our simple fitting instructions will walk you through exactly how to do it!
💡 Smart Safety Tips for Your Home
To give you total peace of mind, here are a few simple steps to follow when setting up your rooms:
- Move the Furniture: Always position beds, cots, highchairs, and any climbable furniture well away from windows so little hands can't reach the blinds.
- Keep Cords Separate: Never tie cord controls together. Also, please never tape or glue your breakaway devices—they need to be able to pop apart to do their vital job!
- Check Your Older Blinds: If you have older blinds in your home, making them safe is incredibly easy. Chain-operated blinds just need a safety tension hook, and cord-operated blinds simply need a cleat fitted to the wall at least 1.5 metres above the floor.
🧸 Proud to Support "Make It Safe"
The British Blind and Shutter Association (BBSA) launched the "Make It Safe" campaign to raise vital awareness about window blind safety. We proudly support this brilliant initiative and echo their commitment to promoting safe environments for children. You can read more at www.makeitsafe.org.uk.
Child safety is a shared responsibility, and we are here to support you every step of the way. If you have any questions at all about our safety features or how to fit your devices, please contact our friendly customer care team.
