Wire not? A one of a kind Case Study

A lot of companies claim to be bespoke, but in order to provide a bespoke solution they use nothing but stock items… This has its advantages of course, but when wanting something truly bespoke it should not be an ‘off the shelf’ range of products that are used.
Mrs Tait approached First Step Designs, and as an artist would wanted her staircase to be one of a kind, whilst competitors would not accept the work, we at First Step Designs perfected a one off design.

We were sent architect plans of the new build property, along with this image below and an image of a zig zag staircase from Pinterest with the hope of merging the two… We here love a challenge.

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Plans and string

Mrs Tait wanted a zig zag style staircase, this feature allows luxurious timber to be on full display by using 40mm American White Oak treads and risers, jointed by a  perfect dovetail joint. Dovetail joints provide a high amount of tensile strength and allow the staircase to become self supporting. In some furniture joints are hidden, we disagree with this method and think the true craftsmanship of this staircase should be on display.

Therefore we offered Mrs Tait two options, if the dovetails wanted to be hidden we could run the grain of the treads horizontally. but if the feature dovetail was chosen we would run the grain vertically. This is a more expensive option, but due to the end grain on display all joints are shown, as you can see in the two visuals below.

Grain direction

Since this property was three story with both staircases at the heart of the home we changed the design so we could create effective apertures for the bespoke balustrade. This resulted in making the main flight wider than the lower flight, allowing us to run the ground floor landing balustrade directly under the upper staircase. This balustrade is purely a guard for the lower well opening, so we created a perfect visual feature all the while saving space on the ground floor. Beautiful.

CAD shot

Mrs Tait actually wanted to use her own material for balustrade, but wanted solid fixing points throughout the flight in order to try and create the most effective and safe patterns.

We planned to fit Steel threads on each step, riser, newel, hand and base rail around the staircase in order to give a substantial amount of fixing points. This allowed the pattern to be done in a cross hatch / net method if needed, but we knew she was going to be creative! We designed a potential method for a visual representation, this level of CGI visualisation allows the client to see the end result before paying a deposit on something that they cannot fully visualise.

With First Step Designs Ltd, every aspect of the job is shared with the customer so nobody is left in the dark. Transparency at its finest.

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Have you seen ideas on Pinterest of other social media that you like but don’t know how to make that dream a reality? Give First Step Designs a call today to start this journey!

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Call now on:

07874091345