Think twice before measuring up the curtains at Downing Street

In theory, a cliché is an expression that through endless repetition becomes a vacuous statement. One exception to this is the phrase “measuring up the curtains”. It is bandied around those looking a little too confident when on the verge of power. But over time it accrues truth and sharpness as a political weapon. 

The expression is modern. It entered mainstream US political jargon in the 1960s when Richard Nixon was accused of having gone to the White House to “measure for drapes”. (Curtains are less grand in US parlance.) By the end of the 20th century, it didn’t even need to be voiced. In a January 1999 episode of The Simpsons, Bill Clinton, in an office on a telephone call, turns to Al Gore who is standing at the window with a tape measure. “Al, do you have to do that right now?” Gore would announce his bid to be president later that year.

In the UK, which is about to have its election as I write, it turns the ascent to power into a Hyacinth Bucket moment in British politics: ambition is not just high office and to serve the nation but also to make the house nice.

This was played out perfectly in character by Margaret Thatcher, who had herself pictured in a pinny in the kitchen. Correspondence released 30 years later to the National Archive show that she made sure her upgrades were entirely in keeping with her housewife budgets.

The proposed costs for the renovation included chair covers for £46, repolished furniture for £123, cleaning the carpets at £527, and an ironing board for £19, a total budget of £1,836, or less than £9,000 in today’s money. Even so, she objected to the profligacy, as shown in her scrawled notes on costings documents. She declined an offer of crockery, £209, paid for out of government funds, and offered to buy the ironing board herself.

Her cabinet displayed her Derby and Staffordshire china. Her curtains and sofas had matching floral patterns.

Cherie Blair despaired at the poverty of taste, as she recounted in her memoirs. She and Tony moved into the flat above Number 11 — larger and more suited to their family of five (later to become six). It was “a series of heavy mahogany wardrobes that smelt of cedar and mothballs”, she wrote. And her “heart sank at the sight of the kitchen”. To have achieved power and to realise this is what it looked like.

But this is what makes the Downing Street shuffle such good fodder for historians. The prime minister’s accommodation is no White House with carefully arranged drapes. Sir George Downing, who built the connected houses of Nos 10, 11 and 12 of Downing Street, was a jerry-builder. Despite its grand appearance, including the William Kent staircase, there have been perpetual conversations about gutting it. No prime minister has ever dared abandon the privilege of living in it. On its falling apart, “everyone admits it after they leave”, Gordon Brown told actor David Tennant on a podcast. But on being asked if the repairs should happen when you are about to step up: “You say no.”

And so it gets patched up and redecorated to make it liveable for the four or five years (hopefully) you are likely to be resident. It is a temporary expression of power by design. In diplomatic circles, there’s a maxim on the rotation of ambassadors: criticise your predecessor’s taste and your successor’s judgment. Or, extruded, don’t blame me for the curtains and it has all gone wrong since I left.

Cherie Blair despaired at the poverty of taste. To have achieved power and to realise this is what it looked like

The Camerons redid the Number 11 flat. Samantha Cameron, a designer by trade, had a kitchen made by contemporary Roundhouse, all sleek steel and marble. The bookcase was by Ikea. It was the basic standards of Notting Hill home styling in the early 21st century: modern but largely middle of the road. Theresa May added a Habitat coffee table and a John Lewis lamp.

By contrast, the ambition of Boris Johnson’s renovation of the Number 11 flat was wildly extravagant, estimated at £200,000; significantly beyond the standard £30,000 allowance. In the end, it turned out the wallpaper was neither gold nor did it cost £840 a roll, as was initially reported. It was yellow, in the kitchen and a mere £120 a roll, as Lulu Lytle, the interior designer subsequently clarified.

This is where the phrase “measuring up the curtains” gets its second wind. First used to belittle a strident political leader’s gaucheness — then it becomes about what they choose. The Johnsons had fundamentally misunderstood British politics: the point about Downing Street is that you can have power but not the trappings of it. They were entitled to curtains but not drapes.

When Rishi Sunak moved into the Number 10 flat, the family also ordered curtains. Nothing extravagant, just “long, fully interlined curtains for all five windows overlooking the garden, hand-pleated and held back with heavy co-ordinating tassels in red, gold and the ivory of the damask”, his Yorkshire designer John Challis told an interviewer. If Sunak has been smart in one thing, it was paying for his own curtains, which he can take with him when goes.

Decor fades over time, as do trends in design. So too does power, as many politicians eventually find out. That ambition for interior decor at the beginning of one’s tenure will come to inform one’s legacy as well. So measure well but measure judiciously. One’s span may not be as long as one hopes.

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