Custom Hand-carved Handrail
Accompanying the photos of this finished project are two CAD drawings. The first is the original stair design in the building plans. The homeowner wanted something more interesting, more organic and asked us to redesign the staircase along those lines. The second drawing is what we came up with and the photos are the results! The stair is freestanding with Alder stringers, handrail and box newels. The handrail is a custom profile and the handrail fittings at the Upper Floor and Landing transitions were all hand carved onsite. The one at the Landing was a single fitting about 4' long to connect the upper handrail with the lower handrail. To avoid having endgrain we first bent a roughly 4" thick (3/16" layers) x 18" tall blank around that 18" radius, at the pitch of the stair. Once bent, the transition between the two rails was hand carved. The tree branch guardrail infill is made from steel round bar with a natural tree bark textured surface. Note the large "W" within the branch design as requested by the Owner to represent their family name. Lastly the treads and risers are walnut and have a hand scrape and sand finish. How do you think it turned out?