The complete guide
Choosing a chain door curtain
What a chain curtain is for
A chain curtain is the commercial answer to a doorway that never stops being used. There is nothing to open and nothing to close. You walk at it, the chains part, and they hang straight again behind you.
That is the whole argument against a hinged screen door in a busy doorway. A screen door in a kitchen or a shop gets propped open by the second week, and once it is propped it is not doing anything. A chain curtain can't be propped open.
Aluminium, and why the finish matters
The chains are aluminium with an oxidation-treated surface.
Both halves of that are worth understanding. Aluminium does not rust, which already puts it ahead of a steel chain in a doorway. The oxidation treatment then makes the surface highly resistant to corrosion, which matters because the places these get hung are warm and damp: back doors, kitchens, conservatories, anywhere with steam or weather.
The result is a curtain you clean rather than maintain. Wipe the chains down and that is the job.
Putting it up
The header strip hangs on two screws. Mark the positions, check they are level, drill, and lift the strip on. Five minutes with a drill.
Two hanging hooks come in the box, so there is nothing else to buy. The one thing to note is that it does need those two screws, which rules it out if you rent somewhere that allows no holes at all. The string curtain hangs on a tension rod instead and needs nothing drilled.
Taking it down again
This is the part that gets overlooked and then appreciated. Because the strip sits on the screws rather than being fixed to them, the whole curtain lifts off in seconds.
Cleaning a chain curtain in place means scrubbing at head height in a doorway. Cleaning one you can carry to a sink takes a couple of minutes. The same applies if you want the doorway clear for an evening or you are moving it to another room.
As a room divider
Plenty of these get bought with insects nowhere in the reasoning. As a divider, chain marks out a zone without walling it off, and it keeps light and air moving between the two spaces.
It also gives a degree of privacy: enough to shield a back-of-house area from a casual glance without shutting it away. In cafes, bars and shops it usually ends up doing both jobs at once.
Choosing black or silver
Same curtain, same price, different room. Silver reads industrial and bounces light around, which suits a kitchen or a retail space. Black recedes, so in a domestic doorway it draws less attention to itself. Neither performs better than the other.