Useful observations for those designing feature staircases

Dear Reader

We hope you find these notes and observations useful; they are based on over 30 years experience of designing, building and installing feature staircases.  Initially you may not appreciate the importance of some of our observations as they may seem obvious or irrelevant but the projects on our web site and the testimony of past clients bears witness to our credentials.

Architects and designers may perhaps only design one or two staircases per year, Demax however are continually designing staircases on a daily basis and checking the same amount of designs by others so we are extremely conversant with the most common errors and how to improve and enhance basic conceptual illustrations to the point where the staircase becomes viable.

In the modern home a staircase serves two purposes, firstly it must be a captivating prime feature to be admired and envied by all and secondly it gets you from one floor to another. The staircase must be designed early and the fully dimensioned drawings incorporated into the main drawings of the property, especially if the stair is elliptical or has any changes in direction. It makes sense to construct the adjoining walls to suit the stairs rather than leave what is thought to be sufficient space and then design the stairs later to fit within that allowed space. This may sound a very obvious statement but you would be surprised how many get it wrong and underestimate just how early in the build program that stair details are required.  

Design early firstly considering the carcass of the staircase; this is normally required as soon as the floors are in to allow the staircase to be used during the construction of the property. Delaying the design can result in costly delays and disappointment. We have seen multi million pound properties where the planning of the stairs has been so lax and late that the structural fixing positions and method had not been designed in readiness. We have seen riser heights of 220mm with goings of 230mm which although legal are uncomfortably steep and certainly not acceptable esthetically. We have seen stairs encroaching far to close to the main entrance. We have seen £50,000 elliptical staircase designed where minimum headroom could not be achieved due to the lack of allowance for floor screeds which when finished incorrectly by 50mm rendered the staircase useless.  We have many more similar horror stories all of which were avoidable had the stairs been planned and drawn at the correct time. Remember you cannot get the “feel” of a staircase from a 1:20 scale drawing.  

Elliptical and spherical staircases are very popular, unfortunately designers cannot walk up and down their drawings otherwise they would appreciate that although complying with building regulations the stairs could be uncomfortable particularly when descending. The outside radius is the prime dimension that controls the graceful feel to the stairs, get it wrong as sadly many do and the result is a narrow tread (going) which combined with high tread height (rise) unnecessarily ruins the look and feel of the staircase, just for the sake of adding an extra 150mm to the stair radius. In fact so common is this error we have constructed two sample staircases to physically demonstrate this point. We feel so strongly about this matter that we will not build staircases to dimensions that we do not agree with even if they comply with Building Regulations.

Please take the time to read the information sheets on our web site that answer FAQ regarding procedures and explain the natural occurrences in materials such as timber and stone.

We have a wealth of information, ideas and experience learnt at our expense at the disposal of committed clients please take advantage and feel free to use it.