Koi Carp Noren Curtain 'Nishikigoi'

Navy noren curtain with two koi carp climbing a waterfall in gold and cream

Two carp climbing a waterfall, one on each panel. This noren is a deep navy ground printed with a waterfall of blue water and cream spray, and two koi in gold-brown scales climbing it, one leaping on the left panel and one turning on the right, with the water swirling round them across the split. It is the one noren in the collection that is a picture rather than a pattern.

It is the noren for a person who knows the story of the carp that becomes a dragon, and for a doorway that should tell it.

The name, Nishikigoi, is the brocade carp, the coloured koi of a garden pond, and the curtain has two.

The curtain is a lightweight woven polyester printed through, hemmed on all sides, with a rod channel sewn across the top and a split running from just below the channel to the hem, so it hangs as two panels that part when you walk through and fall closed behind you. It is photographed on a rod across a doorway at the same scale as every noren in the collection.

Hang it on a tension rod or a dowel through the channel, across a doorway, a kitchen entrance, a corridor, a window or a wall, at a height where the hem clears the head. In Japan it hangs at a shop door to say open and in a house to make one room into two. It moves in a draught and it is meant to.

The scales are the detail: each carp is drawn with its scales in gold-brown and its fins in cream, and the water round it is drawn in curling lines with spray at the crests, so the fish read as moving up. The split falls between the two carp.

Machine wash cool on a gentle cycle, hang to dry, and iron on low if the fold shows. The print is through the cloth and does not fade in an ordinary room; keep it out of direct sun if you want the colour to last for years.

From across a room it is a dark curtain with two fish on it. From close the fish show their scales, the water its curls, and the spray its cream. It is the noren for a hallway and a person who likes a picture on a door.

Nine sizes, width by drop: 55 by 90, 65 by 100, 70 by 120, 80 by 130, 90 by 150, 95 by 160, 100 by 170, 110 by 180 and 120 by 200 cm. Measure the doorway and choose a width a few centimetres wider and a drop that clears the head; the split is in every size.