How to darken an inner tent

How can you create a dark inner tent or sleeping cabin? A special darkening fabric ensures that you can sleep longer.

Do you love camping but hate the overly sunny, early morning hours? In this case, a blackout fabric for your inner tent, sleeping tent or sleeping cabin offers a darker night and a longer sleeping time in the morning. Sleeping outdoors is then possible again. Blackout fabric is a special tent fabric and therefore definitely offers a solution. As a specialist and market leader for inner tent fabrics, we can provide you with useful information and advice.

Which blackout fabric is best suited to darkening an inner tent? Preferably black or otherwise anthracite dark grey

For making a blackout inner tent, a functional inner tent fabric in 100% is fine and functional. Cotton breathes and keeps the climate in the sleeping cabin comfortable. It becomes different if you go camping in very cold conditions or frost. In that case, the polyester-cotton tent fabric mixture comes into play.
100% cotton tent fabric or a polyester-cotton blend is therefore available as inner tent fabric for the production of a blackout inner tent. If you click here, you will find a selection of black and anthracite grey black-out inner tent fabrics.
Blackout inner tent fabric can also be purchased in a 100% cotton version. This is because cotton is breathable, so you won't be bothered by the heat. However, if you are camping in frosty conditions, there is an alternative: in addition to the comfortable, breathable, natural cotton content, a blend of around 52% polyester and 48% cotton is best in this (cold) case. This is because the inner tent fabric in this combination remains both breathable (due to the cotton) and retains heat in frosty conditions (due to the polyester content) and therefore also dries more quickly if the inner tent or sleeping cabin has become damp either through breathing, perspiration or moisture in the tent or trailer.
From a pragmatic point of view, campers should not get below 0 degrees in the inner tent or sleeping cabin and should not sleep too hot in summer.
The inner tent fabric should therefore be a dimensionally stable, weatherproof, durable and hard-wearing special tent fabric, even if the fabric should feel pleasant to the touch.
Regarding weather resistance: Our inner tent fabric is slightly water-repellent and prevents mould. But in an awning, something always falls onto the roof of the sleeping cabin. And these particles can be food for the bacteria we call mould or weather. That is why it is important - despite fungicidal treatment - to always keep the inner tent bone-dry and, of course, to store it as such.

What do you need for a blackout inner tent?

1. black, darkening inner tent fabric or anthracite-coloured, dark grey inner tent fabric. 
2. strong PVC film for the cockpit/groundsheet.
3. sewing thread made from a cotton-polyester mix.
4. suspension rubbers. Rubber rings or elastic bands or hard plastic hooks for hanging.
5. tent tape or twill tape
6. reinforcement tape or PVC corner pieces to reinforce the suspension corners
7. mosquito net; fine mosquito net to let in as much oxygen as possible
8. zips on the tent. Good quality, as the sleeping cabin is used frequently on a daily basis.

Washing a dark inner tent

As already mentioned, our inner tent fabric is slightly water-repellent and therefore impregnated to repel mould. As soon as the sleeping cabin of a tent goes into the washing machine, this finish is washed out. There is also the possibility that the inner tent will shrink slightly after drying. After all, the fabric contains cotton. In practice, this shrinkage can be compensated for by the rubber rings that are often used to hang a sleeping cabin in a tent or trailer tent.
If the fabric has nevertheless become dirty or stained and you decide to wash the inner tent again: set the washing machine to the ‘delicate’ programme and wash for a SHORT time at 20 degrees. Then rinse well with plenty of water and leave the sleeping cabin to air dry for a long time.

Special blackout fabric is available to darken the sleeping area of your tent or caravan

If you would like more detailed information, you can either click on this range of inner tent fabrics or click here to contact us directly. Always welcome.