Floating Stairs

Our walkway, landing and front stairs are done! And with that, the last low-carbon concrete pour as well. Phew!

There’s an interesting backstory to how we winded up with floating stairs. When we bought the house it had a pebble dash front staircase, hemmed in by concrete walls. The cavity underneath was a sweet wine cellar accessed from the basement that we were keen to keep.

As our design evolved, even though we are only adding ~150 sqft of space reconfiguring the main floor, the basement counted as fully finished and we found ourselves at the limit of square footage for the site.

Our District permit reviewers argued the wine cellar (unconditioned) should be included in the finished calcs, exceeded our permissible sqft, and therefore had to be walled off. Very frustrating at the time but there was zero room for discussion.

We subsequently had to pivot to floating front stairs made out of steel/wood/brick/concrete or some structurally sound combination thereof.

Fast forward to today, our front entry is finally complete and we can start to think about drinking summer beers on the stoop and landscaping around the entrance. Can’t wait to bring back some greenery to what has been a muddy site for a year and a half! 🌿

#netzero #netzerohome #stairs #floatingstairs #hardscape #lowcarbonconcrete #greenbuilding #sustainability

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