Are there different staircase regulations for different parts of the UK ?

The answer is yes, and if you add the Republic of Ireland the answer is yes again, although it has to be said there is a common theme.

The following will tell who has the power of building life or death over you.
England and Wales together (God bless them for using common sense)
Scotland on its own (all the fault of devolution over common sense)
Northern Ireland on its own (ditto)
Republic of Ireland on its own (who can blame them)

You would think that as E U are trying to get us all together under a common set of rules, that a couple of little islands off the coast of the mainland could at least get there act together for the good of building kind, but not a bit of it. ‘We have our own nice new parliament so we will have our own building rules, thank you very much’
When you see just how far apart these small islands that speak the same language are, it does not bode well for the European Union, not to mention the ‘mankind to save the planet brigade’.

OK already, I will get off my frustrated high horse and stick to the point.

So we now know who is in charge of our own little castle (and what I think of it) but what difference does it make?

Well as regards staircases it is confusing because all the rules seem to based on the English/Welsh regulations, but with a few little awkward differences that seem to be added just to say “we have not copied sir honestly”.

For instance the requirement of the amount of tread that you have to stand on (going) on a domestic stair is
England & Wales, minimum 220mm (I cannot imagine who came up with this)
Scotland, minimum 225mm (either a sad joke or a mistake surely)
N.I., minimum 220mm
Ireland, minimum 220mm but optimum 250mm (what are you on about?)

Now this difference may seem like nothing, but most kit stair manufacturers based their designs on a compromise to try to keep everybody happy in Europe, and as lots of places have far less of a going requirement they chose 220mm as their maximum. This was all fine and dandy until the Scottish law makers rocked the boat and added an extra 5mm. This at a stroke excluded their population from using the basic (best thing since sliced bread) kit stairs that everybody else uses.
The Irish having introduced an optimum 250mm means that no building inspector would look happily at a measly 220mm again, although in my experience the farther West that you get the less this applies.

OK I have insulted just about everybody now but you get my point. Trying to design and work with staircases that have to have different geometry for different locations is an unnecessary nightmare.

The following is one example of that amuses me in the rules governing spiral staircases.
By the nature of the beast spiral stairs have great difficulty following the geometry of straight staircases.
You cannot for instance have a going of 220mm on a 1500mm diameter spiral staircase without causing head clearance problems as you ascend the stair. Take my word for it, or read the blogs relating to spiral staircases for an explanation).
The clever people at the British Standards institute realised this and produced a nice clear set of rules covering spiral staircases. The going requirement for a 1500mm spiral stair being a mere 145mm min.
So when the Building Regulation people came to write their rules, thinking about the geometry of spiral stairs made their head hurt, so they all plumped for “if you build it to BS 5395 it will be acceptable to us, end of story”. It is OK having to make rules but you do not want to work to hard thinking about it, “lets just shove an extra 5mm on some where and go and have a drink.”

There are other small differences between the various Regulations governing staircases, these can become important, so do not assume that if it is OK in Scunthorpe it will be OK in Coleraine. Always check with your specific Local Authority

The Staircase Doctor.
(On his way to the asylum the staircase doctor denied all knowledge of writing this epistle, please forgive him poor old chap, it has been a bad day)

Space saver stairs and the Building Regulations
In England and Wales Part K of the Building Regulations specifies what you can and cannot do with staircases, in Scotland it is part 4 of the technical handbook, in Ireland it is part K of their Regulations and in Northern Ireland it is part H.
They are all different, and when it comes to space saving stairs I believe that only England & Wales have a separate set of rules covering the use of space saver stairs. I have to be honest and say that I have never been totally sure of who allows what when it comes to space saving stairs, the rules such as they are, can be open to interpretation, and in my experience different Local Authorities have different attitudes to space saver stairs. Over the years I have had discussions with Building Control people all over the shop and the feed-back I have been given is

England and Wales: Space saver stairs are OK as long as the meet part K 1.22-1.24 but a few Authorities will find any reason to object.

Scotland: They will not have them at any price

Ireland: Seem to be more easy going, I do not remember an objection to a sensibly used space saver stair.

Northern Ireland: Generally the same as England and Wales

So that is what I think is the case for all of our small group of islands, but let us face it, if in doubt you have to ask your own specific Local Building Authority, I have never ceased to be amazed at the different responses that I have heard on this subject. To be fair it is probably not the most common or the most important question that the average Building Control inspector will have to give a decision on, so I would expect a variation in response.

OK now that it is as clear as mud as to who allows what, let us now look at what exactly a space saver stair is as defined in Part K of the Welsh/English Regs.

The terms space saver stair or space saving stair are both nice and self-explanatory but strictly speaking the only way to save space over a standard staircase is to make it steeper. The only way to make it steeper and still have enough tread to stand on is to have a special paddle shaped tread which alternate left and right. So the Regulations refer to a space saver staircase as an alternating tread staircase.

The mind set of the Building Regulations as regards stairs is to make rules that make stairs safe to use in a normal situation, and adequate for evacuation in the case of an emergency. From this you can see that alternate tread stairs which are steep and require a bit of thought to walk up and down, are not suitable for evacuation for a large number of people who are in a hurry.

To that end Part K of the Regulations allow the use of space saver stairs in a domestic property providing the are used as follows.
1. They must only be used in one or more straight flights for a loft conversion and only then when there is not enough space to accommodate a full staircase.
2. They can give access to one habitable room with an associated ensuite bathroom.
3. The steps must have parallel nosing
4. There should be a handrail on both sides
5. The rise and going and non-slip treads should comply with the rules the same as full staircases.
These points are my brief interpretation of Part K but you can see the drift, and you can also see that they are open to discussion on what is allowed, the following are some of the different and odd views that I come across in my time in the staircase world.

“It says loft conversion so you cannot use it to access your single room cellar”
Thankfully a one off view that was over ruled by a more enlightened boss. Although you have to accept that a cellar with no windows is probably not the best place to have to evacuate from in the case of a house fire.

“The treads have to be parallel so you cannot have a turn at the bottom”
Again rarely enforced, the truth is that a turn at the bottom of a kit space saver is actually very useful and jumpable if you are in a hurry to evacuate. In my opinion two small straight flights with a quarter landing in between will comply, but is no more safer than winding treads.

“ A study is not bedroom so you cannot use a space saver stair”
Actually wrong because the Regs say a habitable room, but the point is valid in the case of say, a kitchen (more risk of fire), or a lounge (potential for lots of people at a party)

“You can put a full stair in one of your bedrooms so you cannot use a space saver stair on the landing”
Sheer badness brought on by a falling out over other differences of opinion between inspector and client. A staircase is always an easy target, a bit like telling a policeman at a random vehicle check that he should be out catching criminals. I guarantee he will find a fault with your brand new Merc.

In this age no one should be put off using space saving staircases, in my opinion they are more safe to use than you think, and they provide access in places where you just could not reasonably get a full staircase. I have been involved with hundreds of them and know for a fact that they work without problems. ‘Touch wood’ I have yet to hear of an accident that could be said to have occurred due to the use of a space saving staircase in lieu of a full staircase.

Having been around for a long time I can also say that modern Building Control Departments are far more helpful and user friendly than they ever were in days of yore. In most cases if you ask first, you will get good practical advice and a common sense attitude from you local guy or gal. ‘It pays to talk’
The staircase doctor

Good question; it applies to flight style staircases as well as spiral staircases. There is actually a requirement in the BS 5395 for treads to pass a slip test. Unfortunately unless someone has paid a fortune to have say a wooden spiral stair tread officially tested to B.S. it is very difficult to know what is acceptable. Not many stair manufacturers are likely to go that far because the costs are prohibitive.

Also Continental kit staircase manufacturers (which is just about everybody) would spend forever trying to get these tested and approved to the varying standards of each country that they market to. Personally I think common sense has to be applied, ask your mum what she considers to be non-slip. If a six year old in socks can slip on it, then it is slippy. But then again just about every surface in house can fit that category, so a judgement call has to be made. Do you spoil your nice oak tread spiral staircase or do you sacrifice the kids, no contest of course, no one spoils a perfectly good spiral staircase. In answer to the original question I think the surface of any planed timber particularly if it is sealed would not pass the BS test . Unfortunately we like our wood smooth and usually shiny and that will always be slippy to a certain extent.

There is no magical type of timber that can defy this rule. There are some specialist surface finishes that are sold as non-slip, but I have yet to hear of any staircase manufacturer that has attempted to apply these to timber staircase treads. As you have asked the question, you are obviously concerned about slipping on a spiral staircase that is understandable. The only way to really be sure if it is a big issue is to roughen, cover or groove.

Roughen.

Some spiral stair manufacturers do leave the surface of the treads slightly rougher in an attempt to add a bit of non-slip, but it is not really enough, and not a good selling point either. Just like cars we buy by looks not safety. So the only option is to get spiral stair treads rubbed down again with a coarse sanding belt until you think you have an acceptable surface and then reseal it. Resealing will of course make it some what smoother again.

Cover Carpet, non-slip mats or non-slip tape.

The first two are obvious the third is a selotape type product that you can buy. It is in fact just sticky backed tape but with a coarse surface. This is simply stuck to the finished surface of the wood in strips or little squares. It is usually clear tape but will still be visible on the surface. It works and does not look too bad. It is also ideal to retro fit if someone complains about the slippy treads. Carpet or mats are always difficult to finish neatly at the edges, the best solution, although the most complicated is to rout out the middle of the tread to the depth of the carpet, leaving a border around the edges, so that you end up with a carpeted insert like a door mat well.

Groove.

Just like your garden timber decking you can groove the surface to create no-slip but unfortunately it will look a little like decking.

As you can see there is no magic solution to this potential hazard, personally I am not really sure how big a problem it is in a domestic property. Varnished timber is not that slippy and regular use educates people to be aware. If you have the very young or the very old likely to being using the staircase I think I would retro fit the tape first and see how you get on. It has the added advantage that you can take it off again.

The Stair Doctor

The term riser bar is not really an original building trade term like noggin, tingle or hip iron, all of which would be recognised by your carpenter grandfather. It is a relatively new description of a device which was introduced to allow open tread stairs including spiral stairs and straight stairs to comply with the UK Building Regulations.

Under all versions of the regulations including England and Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Ireland there is a rule that states, a 100mm sphere should not be able to pass through the gap between treads on open riser stairs. This rule is designed to prevent sprogs of all ages from getting limbs stuck in holes. Open tread stairs (ones without a vertical piece of wood blocking the gap between treads) are now all the rage, because they create the open see through look that is in vogue. The down side is that they do not comply with the dreaded 100mm sphere rule. So in order to meet this rule along came the riser bar.

As long as this imaginary 100mm ball cannot go through the gap everything is honky dory. Therefore there is not need to close the gap completely, a simple timber batten say 90mm deep screwed to the back of one tread will reduce a typical gap of say 180mm enough to comply. To create an even more see through look most kit stair manufacturers have gone step further and supply a simple steel bar or tube, usually U shaped that again is fixed to one tread and allows the gap to comply, but has the added advantage that it leaves a clear see through view.

These kits are available for most types of kit stairs, including spiral staircases, space saver stairs and modular flight staircases. They are always sold as an extra, mainly because the UK and Ireland are just about the only places where this odd little rule is required. Our continental cousins scratch their heads in disbelief when we insist that they are necessary! I would be really interested to see statistics that compare between the UK and everybody else the number of kids heads per year that get stuck in stairs. I have a feeling we would be surprised.

The Staircase Doctor.

Building Regulation stairs Here in my royal palace at Staircase Kingdom I have noticed an increase in both phone and web requests from people asking for information on ‘building regulation stairs’. Nothing wrong with that, it is a good idea to ask questions if you are in need of a staircase and want to know that it complies with the Building Regulations.

The only problem with the request ‘building regulation stairs’ is that the people who ask it normally assume that ‘building regulation stairs’ are something that they can buy off the shelf and use anywhere for any purpose and they will comply with the regulations. Unfortunately life is not that simple, no staircase can be described as a building regulation staircase because no staircase can actually comply in every situation that you wish to use it in. The regulations vary depending on location and usage.

For instance it is quite obvious that a staircase that is suitable for your loft conversion would not be suitable as access to the gallery in a Cinema. The Building Regulations are designed so that such things as stairs and ramps provide safe access in both normal use and in an emergency evacuation situation. Therefore as a general rule the bigger the number of people using the stair the bigger the stair needs to be. It is obvious that non-domestic stairs require a higher degree of safety than domestic stairs that are used by less people.

So the regulations for non-domestic staircases are far tighter, and I have to say more confusing. Domestic stairs are covered by Part K (protection from falling, collision and impact) of the Building Regulations. For Non-domestic stairs you can add onto this Part M (Access and facilities for disabled people) and The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 for starters, not to mention various British Standards etc. So if you are into non-domestic stairs you need to be a specialist, and are in no need for advice from me, so this blog is about domestic stairs only.

Without getting too complicated Domestic Building Regulation staircases really fall into two categories (this is my description you will not see these categories in part K)

Main house stairs serving more than room
Secondary stairs serving only one room

Unfortunately there is no middle ground we are talking large or small, there is no provision for medium serving a couple of rooms, this can make life complicated.

Main house stairs.

In order for a stair to be considered a ‘building regulation stair’ it would need to meet the rise going and pitch requirements of part K, plus a host of other requirements, but the first three are what determines the size of a stair and this is usually the stumbling block when people are considering a ‘building regulation stair’. “ Will it be too big to fit in my location? So if it serves more than one room think of the space that a typical house stair takes up and you will not be far wrong, because they also have to comply with the Regs. You cannot save space with a ‘building regulation’ main staircase for your house, the geometric requirements of the Regulations will not allow it.

Be careful with kit stairs these usually have adjustable rise and going so they may comply or not depending how you use them, and this again will be determined by the space you have available on the lower floor, the size of the aperture in the upper floor and your floor-to-floor height. Also be aware that if you are replacing a steep old stair in say a Victorian terrace, the chances are that neither the space nor the aperture will be large enough to insert a new building regulation stair in its place.

Secondary staircases serving one room.

The clever people at the Building Regulations realised that it would be impossible to force main house stair requirements on say a loft conversion, because a lot houses simple did not have the space to put a full staircase on the existing landing. So some clever clogs came up with the idea of allowing single room loft conversions to use a less stringent set of rules. The thought being that one bedroom will only be used by say two people and therefore less people will use this type of stair, so the requirements can be less stringent.

This type of stair specifically excludes kitchens (big risk of fire) or lounges ( big risk of lots of participants in a Roman orgy needing to run for it). Two or more rooms and you are back to a main house building regulation stairs. Spiral staircases have their own set of rules (BS53095 part 2) see my other blogs on this subject.

I also have to point out that there is no provision in the Scottish Regs for space saver stairs ( I can not imagine why!!) So in this special category of stair you are allowed to have a much steeper stair that will take up less room, approx half that of a main stair. This is achieved using special paddle shaped treads that allow enough tread to stand on one side only of each tread. They are called alternate tread stairs and actually work better than you expect and the space that they save is amazing. (see my blogs on space saver stairs for more specific details).

There are lots of other rules governing these stairs but generally you can have one made or purchase a kit that will comply with the regulations but as with the main house stairs you cannot assume that your space dimensions will allow a compliant stair to fit. The moral of this tale is do not ask silly questions that assume any stair can be a building regulation stair in your castle. Give ‘a man who knows’ your details and let him advise you.

The Staircase Doctor

First we have to define what we mean by a trapezoid or we will all be confused! This is not as simple as it sounds; I blame the Greeks (probably Proclus and Euclid) for not getting their act together. The result is that a Brit like me thinks a trapezoid is an irregular quadrilateral i.e. a four-sided figure with no parallel sides, where as my American cousin The Elevator Doctor thinks it has two parallel sides.

As my middle name is John Bull I am sticking with the English version in this blog, so there! So we have this odd shaped four-sided lump of wood, but what has it got to do with a spiral staircase. Well a typical landing to any spiral staircase, and particularly a kit spiral stair, has a triangular shaped top tread that acts as both the last step and a landing area at the top of the spiral stair. It also has the function of securing the centre pole of the spiral staircase to the top of the structure, so it is an important element in spiral stair construction.

The triangular landing tread usually has 60 degree angles so in practice this makes it about twice the size of all the other treads. This in turn helps to make the whole spiral stair structure more stable because it allows for more than one fixing point to the structure at the top of the spiral stair. It also makes the landing function of the top tread big enough to work as landing. The down side of a triangular landing is that if you have a square structural aperture in the upper floor, the spiral stair landing can only be fixed in the centre of any of the four sides, so there are only four exit points 3,6,9 & 12 o’clock. You have to take my word for this or draw it a scrap of paper and you will see that you have to change the triangular shape if you want to step off anywhere else, like say at one of the corners.

A point worth noting is that if you make circular aperture this does not apply you can finish the landing anywhere with a triangular landing as long as you scribe and cut the outer edge of the triangle to suit the shape of the circle. Therefore you will end up with a segment of a circle landing instead of a triangle, but lets not go any further down that alley, it is really not what this blog is about, and circular apertures are more difficult to construct than square ones. So the solution if you want step off your spiral staircase in the corner rather than the middle is to use an odd shaped landing, which we Brits and most Europeans call a trapezoidal landing and our colonial cousins call a trapezium.

If you are concentrating you will by now be thinking why does it have to be an odd shape, why can it not be just a square that fills the whole corner of the aperture? Well in some circumstance you are right you can use a square landing but in most case it is fraught with danger. The problem with a square landing is that it projects more than any other landing shape over the lower treads, and this can create serious head clearance height problems as you ascend or descend the spiral.

The solution to this is to cut the corner off the square to create more headroom, and what you are left with is a trapezoid shaped landing. So using a trapezoidal landing gives you 8 (2 at each corner) more options for stepping off positions at the top of the spiral stair. You will also have more variations for stepping on points at the bottom of the spiral stair. So by choosing between a triangular and trapezoidal spiral stair landings you will have a dozen variations, one of which hopefully will suit your project.

Bear in mind that when a spiral stair kit manufacturer produces a range, they have to consider how many variations in parts that it is economic for them to produce and stock. The result of this calculation is that usually the cheaper entry-level spiral staircases such as the Arke Klan are only offered with the more common triangular landing. Where as the more up market spiral stair ranges such as the Albini & Fontanot Genius range offer both triangular and trapezoidal landings.

Another word of warning, some manufacturers have scratched their heads and attempted to design a universal landing that is all singing and dancing for both triangular and trapezoidal landing situations. In my opinion no one has yet managed to cheat the geometry and make one work without compromising the width of the exit point. Personally I stick to the ‘either or’ systems I know that they do what it says on the tin.

The Staircase Doctor

Oh dear I wish it was the first time that I have been asked that question! In these modern times everyone is trying to create more space within the confines of the box in which they live.

It is no longer acceptable to have your clothes in a wardrobe in the corner of the bedroom, one just has to have a separate walk in dressing room. I am being cynical, there is nothing wrong with making use of the unused space in our castle, after all we have mortgaged ourselves up to the hilt for it, so why not use it all I say. The problem starts when you cast you eye around looking for unused space on the ground and first floor of your palace, you then realise there isn’t any. Eventually your eye falls on that total waste of space the hall, stairs and landing. All we have to do is plonk a spiral staircase in there, save loads of space, and put the snooker table in it.

To understand why life is never that simple, we have to first consider the past. Most of the housing stock in the UK is less than 150 years old, during the whole of that period designers of houses were striving to make the best use of space within the properties that they were designing, it is not a new idea to get the best use out of limited space.

The point I am making is that you are almost certainly not the first to try to do it in your property. The chances are that the first guy knew what he/she was talking about and did as good a job as is possible. OK in older designs there may be too many internal walls creating boxy little rooms that were the fashion then. Removing a few of these will be no problem, but the staircase is a different matter all together.

Other than in ’space no object’ grand designs, stairs were never a selling point and so designers always did their best not to waste space with them. The geometry of a safe building regulation compliant staircase is such that you cannot make it smaller in size (that is also true of changing a traditional staircase to a spiral staircase). You can change the shape and reposition it within the building, but you will not gain any extra space as such.

If you are thinking of repositioning the staircase to make better use of your space then it probably will only become viable if you are ripping out all of the internal walls on both floors to totally change the room layout. Stairs have to pass through a hole in the upper floor, and the shape of that hole is very specific to the shape of the stair. A change of shape or position means serious alteration to upper floor structure. If you are prepared for that sort of upheaval then the world is you oyster, modern open plan flight stairs or spiral staircases are works of art, they look superb in open plan living areas that are in vogue right now.

You could end up with your dream home in that former boring sixties semi, it will cost you, and you will not have gained an inch of space, but it will feel like it has.

The stair doctor.

The answer is that you can but it almost certainly will not work in your property. The problem is all a question of the size of your feet! In order to be useable the centre of each tread of a spiral stair needs to be big enough front-to-back to safely take your size twelve’s.

Although I do not know how they did it, the nice people at the British Standards Institute have clearly defined how much tread you need at various points on the width of the tread in order for the spiral staircase to be safe to use. Once you accept that fact, it will determine how many degrees of rotation each tread will require in order to provide this safe footfall dimension.

This is not a fixed number of degrees it will vary depending on the diameter of the spiral staircase. The bigger the diameter of the spiral stair the smaller the number of necessary degrees of rotation will be needed to provide the magic minimum dimension (think about it and you will understand why). “So how does this all affect my need for a half a circle spiral” Well a typical height domestic spiral stair will need 13 treads to safely reach the upper floor, any less and the step between each tread will be too much, not to mention being over the Building Regulation maximum tread rise of 220mm. Each of these spiral stair treads will need to rotate between approx 30 degrees (1200mm diameter spiral stair) and approx 27 degrees (1600mm diameter spiral stair). Multiply by 13 and you will see that for a typical spiral staircase your stepping on and off points will be about a full circle apart.

Were you to attempt to cram 13 treads into half a circle rotation it would be possible but you would not have enough tread to stand on. Obviously things change if you have a very low or very high floor-to-floor height that requires more or less treads, and as already said larger diameter spirals will need less degrees of rotation. However as a rough rule of thumb you can think of a spiral stair rotation as the hands of a clock each treads rotates 5 minutes giving 12 treads to a complete circle (bigger spiral stairs go up to 16 treads or more).

There are other things that a spiral staircase manufacturer has to consider when considering the geometry of a spiral stair, but the main purpose of this blog is to dispel the idea that you can make a spiral stair do anything you wish as regards the stepping on and off points. Unfortunately you cannot cheat on the geometry just because you want to.

The Staircase Doctor.

When you construct any staircase either a straight flight stair or a spiral stair, it will normally have to pass through an aperture in the upper floor. This aperture will need protection around it to prevent users falling through the hole. This is normally done with either walls or landing balustrading.

The landing balustrading will generally be of the same construction as the stair balustrading. Nearly all kit staircases have matching landing balustrading available that is supplied as an extra to the basic kit and is sold in a standard kit length say 1000mmm or 1200mm. These kits have to be sold as an extra because it is not possible to predict the size of aperture, so including a set length in the stair kit would never work. In my experience people tend to under estimate the amount and the cost of landing balustrading, thinking they will save money and sort that out later.

In reality both stair and landing balustrading are costly and important elements which should not be overlooked in the original budget. Typical kit staircase balustrading will cost approx £100 per metre, and to go all the way around the circular aperture of say a 1600mm diameter spiral stair you will need approx 4000mm of landing balustrading (this excludes the stepping off point).

Therefore you will need to spend approx £ 400 on top of a typical £ 1500 spiral stair kit, not a small sum! It is also doubtful that there is much of a saving to be made by buying in standard timber balustrade elements from any of the DIY stores. In my experience when you add up the cost of the elements that are needed you will find a similar cost to the matching kit supplied by the stair manufacturer.

The moral is that stair balustrading is not that cheap. So how do these kits work? The answer is not that complicated, you first have to establish the overall length that you need, and simple purchase enough kits to cover that length. Most manufacturers include all the parts that you need in each kit to make up any shape that you want (check before you buy that your manufacturer does this). So each kit will include for instance

1. A handrail joining element that allows you to join standard handrail lengths (usually 1200mm. Long) into one continuous length.
2. A handrail elbow, allowing you to join two lengths of handrail at 90 degrees.
3. A wall fixing allowing you to attach the balustrade to a wall.
4. A reaction bar, which is a bow shaped element that gives balustrading stability in longer runs.

Add to this the facts that you can cut to length the handrail to suit any length and that you can order kits for round or square aperture shapes plus join landing balustrade onto stair balustrade and there is very little that you cannot achieve with a well designed balustrade kit.

A serious word of warning, kit balustrading does not have newel posts. A newel post is the vertical solid post that you see on traditional stairs that give the balustrade rigidity. This important topic is discussed in another blog ‘What are newel posts for’.

The Staircase Doctor.

A question that is asked all the while these days, when everyone is trying to utilise all that wasted space in the loft. The big problem is not having the loft space but getting up to it. This is particularly the case in smaller Victorian terrace style house where landing space is at a premium. You will find that I have dealt with ‘ putting space saver stairs over the house stair’ in a previous blog, so this blog goes on to cover situations where that is a non starter.

Trying to put any stair on a small landing is difficult, and even with a space saver stair like say the Karina it is far from certain that you will have the room. Lets look at some dimensions, a typical space saver stair kit will require just a small floor area of approx 1550mm long by 600mm wide. However 600mm is a lot to take out of a typical terrace landing width which will probably about 1200mm. wide. So if you have to walk past the space saving stair on the landing it will only leave a 600mm clear walkway. Not a lot, particularly if you are of the well built variety of Homo erectus.

Let us assume you have the basic width to accommodate yourself and the space saver staircase on the landing, now the problem is, are the doors in the way? This is the basic question to be answered by this blog. I have lost count of the number of people who have come to me with ideas for using a space saver stair that they can just fit in providing you can access a bedroom door beneath it. In the vast majority of cases this is simple not possible, although some people find this difficult to believe, ‘there is loads of space above the door’ is the cry.

The answer as to why not, is all maths I am afraid, so try to stick with me.

1. A typical floor-to floor height is say 2750mm (9 ft)
2. The top tread of a space saver stair starts one step down from the upper floor at approx 2550mm
3. The steel work supporting that space saver stair tread projects down another 450mm so it is 2550-450 =2100mm from the lower floor to the underside of the steel support.
4. A door is approx 1980mm high so from the top of the door to the underside of steel for the top tread you only have 120mm (5”) clearance.
5. Each tread moves down say another 200mm (8”) approx so the underside of steelwork to floor for the next tread down will be 1780, that means it will project down over the doorway by 80mm (3”)

So in a typical situation you can only have the doorway under the very top tread of the space saver stair over the doorway, which is not a lot of stair.

In most typical terrace or semi-detached houses you will only get a space saving stair up to the loft if you can put it over the main house stair or you move walls around to create more space on your landing. There are exceptions and some house designs are perfect for a landing space saver stair, but make sure you talk to ‘a man who knows’ before put the snooker table in your new loft games room.

The Staircase Doctor.