What goes up…..

Must come down, right? Well, in this case, that is indeed correct. What I am referring to is the new stairway leading from the Pulp Deck to the Pulp Patio (or vice versa for those times when you just need to go up)! If you have been following the progress pics and narrative, a couple weeks ago we started with the grand plan to connect the two projects and basically give us a second way to get from one level to the other without having to re-enter the house itself to do so. Now while only separated by about eight vertical feet, that is one pretty big leap without stairs and using a ladder, while doable, just doesn’t lend itself to going from down to up especially when carrying something. So stairs became the obvious choice and then it was merely a matter of how and what we’d like that to look like. Originally we thought of possibly doing a spiral staircase, which would have been nice and seemingly something fairly pleasant looking (also being fairly compact and space conservative), however, after doing a bit of research and after looking at a lot of sample pics, we started thinking maybe not. First up, we had a weird height we needed to hit (patio to deck is exactly 90 inches) to be flush while keeping in mind that the patio is also pitched away from the house meaning we definitely didn’t have a level landing surface. Then there is the cost, as in, if we had one custom made to our needs (and for being outdoors and exposed to the elements) we were talking pretty expensive. Now it turns out that they also make spiral staircase kits which essentially can be used within a height range and are reasonably priced, but, we’re still stuck with that height number and didn’t seem like that was going to be a direct hit so something would have to give either at the top or bottom (aka, say a step off at bottom or step up at top would need to be built) so again, not thinking that was the way to go. And lastly, just thought it might be tough carrying things up and down a spiral staircase without getting dizzy. So…..

Another look at our surroundings and it became clear that we had plenty of room to work with, why not go with a traditional staircase made of all pressure treated wood (you know, the outdoor thing). We could paint all of the risers and supports a nice bright white but keep the stair treads their original wood color giving it what I like to refer to as “the beach look”. But how exactly do we go about making such a thing? I did remember that Home Depot/Lowe’s both make prefabbed stair risers (which I had used on smaller step ups), essentially 2” x 12” boards with cuts in them to support a stair tread. But I also remembered that they only came in certain sizes and we certainly weren’t going to make it with just one set of risers. Turns out there is a calculator for determining the number of steps you need based on height and after crunching the numbers, seems we were going to need between 12 and 13 steps all in. Also seems the largest prefabbed risers available were 6 steps which leaves us a little caught between a rock and a hard place. But then the light bulb idea came from Ms. Pulp, as in, why don’t we come off of the Deck level and go down a few steps to a landing, then have the whole thing make a 90 degree turn and run parallel to the deck. Problem solved. We were just going to need one more landing on that run to make it all the way, pretty much going 4 steps/landing, 4 steps/landing, and 4 steps/landing getting us our 12 steps down (the 12-13 thing comes in play when you account for the pitched patio and making up the difference while keeping the steps level (you’ll see in the progress pics that I basically gave the lower side a “high heel” if you will and did the same for the other two risers with gradually smaller “heels” to attain that flat landing). The reason for not going with 6 step risers and just two of them was simply to keep the stairs a little tighter to the house and not extend too far out onto the patio.

Anyway, the result of all of this is one big, majestic and dare I say, game changing staircase which just adds to the beauty of both the recently finished Pulp Patio and Deck (don’t worry, the Pulp Porch is next on the list to rehab, you can see it just to the right of the Deck when you are looking up at it). I decided to call it a “Destination Staircase”, the kind that folks travel from miles away just to come see and hang out on! Well, maybe they come over for a cold one and say, “nice staircase”, which would also be cool.

Back to it, finishing up the side railing installs and the grand plan is to be doing 4th of July grilling from atop the new Pulp Deck come Monday. Speaking of which, a very Happy 4th of July to you all and I’ll see you next week!