I've used this material before - It's a woven that has wrinkles built in...based on my experience, there is nothing special you need to do regarding tension - just do what you normally do with your quilting material - if there is a tension problem, you can adjust, but I've never encountered these issues. As you sew, you can either stretch the fabric by holding it front and back of the needle and let the feed dogs pull it through or, you can hold the fabric loosely in front of the needle in which case the feed dogs will occasionally feed a small fold thru the stitches...If you do the first - the seamline of you curtains may look weird when you finish the seam, but laundering it will make it scrunch back into the original shape. In the second case - the little folds that some naturally in the material will be in the seam, and won't be seen when they're on the rod. I usually feed mine loosely thru the feed dogs because I don't want to have to wash them before I hand them. I also don't usually press these because that can flatten the natural look of the material - you can put them into the dryer with a wet towel to freshen them up if you want. or ordinary laundering after they're made is OK.