Stair of the Week: Why We Have Handrails

I think that is the neatest bookshelf I ever saw!

Designers who choose staircases like this are sacrificing functionality, safety, and accessibility for aesthetics. Depending on the client, perhaps this tradeoff makes sense, maybe these stairs are in the residence of a young able-bodied person who doesn't have many visitors, I don't know.

But for most applications where the stairs might be used by an older person, children, or people with limited mobility, it makes sense to have stairs that allow full access of the building to as many people as possible, so a good stair design would naturally include features like handrails, etc. Truly innovative design should look great AND work well, I think sacrificing one for the other shows limited creativity on the part of the designer.

Stairs are a good idea, like seatbelts. They often are more for visitors then the original residents. And might be critical for emergency personel.

I saw fireman one one end of a stretcher, with a 200 pound man on it, loose his footing and catch himself on a stair railing that creaked under the strain but did not break. They both would have dropped 6-7 feet to the floor. Maybe not fatal, but you never know.

There is plenty of room for artistic solutions with railings. Think of it as just another challange. The storage stairs could have them extent out from under the stairs or even have the retractable for when not in use or until visitor are present.

I agree with GNiessen: the minute you, your children, or even your pets trip over a step and go tumbling over the edge, you'll regret leaving it out in favor a clean appearance. No matter now nice it looks, a 8-10 foot fall onto hardwood floors is not worth it.

The "think of it as another challenge" comment is especially important. It's why we have stylish bicycle helmets and automobile bumpers. If I had a staircase like that and I was concerned with adding a design-friendly rail, I would place an ultra-thin, color-matched railing atop a plexi-glass sheet for a stand. It would look just as good, and be safe. Tough to clean? Of course - but I'm concerned with appearances, so I bet I'm up to it.

Lloyd,

Safety.

There are reasons for building codes and most of them come down to the one word answer; safety -- Lessening accident risk, safety -- Decreasing health risk, safety -- Increasing fire protection, safety.

From a responsible adult no children in the house point of view -- "Oh look great stairs, I love the shelves".

From a former volunteer firefighter, kindergarten teacher, and construction worker point of view-- "Where the #@%$ is the railing, someone could get hurt!"

Oh and for those of you who assume I'm swearing above .... s'not ( it's a hint ) :D

Ooh, retractable! I wonder how that would work? I could see a wall-side railing that pops out of the wall, but that would involve a lot of moving parts (read: more things to break). The poles for a railing on the non-wall side could slide into pockets built into the bookcase area, but then you'd have a railing at your feet when it was away...

I agree that requiring railings does not stifle innovation. Seriously, a good stair designer can design a railing to go with his/her stairs.

Sure, adding a railing to some of those cantilevered stairs might take away their visual simplicity, but if done right could augment their 'magical' appearance.

i think you should have more freedom when its a residence, but i think railings are essential when you have mulitple occupants. especially ones that are blind, elderly, or, like in my case, have no depth perception. i use the handrail to tell me which is the last step to the landing and prevent vertigo in many cases. i actually think that not having handrails in public spaces would prevent people from using them. (i'm an architect btw) in the office i worked we had a storage staircase that went to a mezzanine. i had to go up it before it had railings or guardrails and it was a terrifying experience. i realized then how much i depended on handrails! and btw the stairs had handrails and guardrails added which didn't negatively effect the design and storage use at all.

My dad recently became disabled, and that has sensitized me to the issue of accessibility. Many of us will be disabled at some point in our lives. We've made great strides in designing accessibility into our buildings; let's not deliberately design accessibility back out.

These stairs lack both hand rails and some sort of barrier that prevents people from falling off the staircase. I can imagine some pretty nasty accidents if an elderly or disabled person regularly used one of those staircases. Even agile, sure-footed people slip and lose their balance sometimes.

What really gives me the heebie-jeebies, though, is imagining active, small children using this staircase. That staircase would be a kid magnet, and it would be difficult for a parent to supervise and keep kids safe on it.

People who tend to eschew railings also fall down the stairs a lot breaking expensive martini glasses which is why I advocate mandatory helmet laws for in home safety.

As some one who has had elderly relatives saved by stout stair rails, I wouldn't even look at this house for purchase unless they installed railings.
I have dogs, cats, kids, elderly residents, and have been known to "eat it" on the stairs myself in the past. Stair railings are a necessity not a luxury. Those stairs actually look "wrong" (awful) to me without a railing.

I think it's a bad (unwritten) assumption that handrails (or more correctly, guardrails) are ugly. There are some requirements for building egress that tend to make commercial stair rails pretty uniform, but these are often relaxed in residential settings such as that shown above. No handrails for stairs that have a rise of greater than say 42" is not only illegal in most jurisdictions, it's plain irresponsible.

Obviously you've never been so injured or so ill that you've had to use the handrail to drag yourself up the stairs.

Railings are VERY necessary. If you want a staircase to your loft, that's fine, but not in a public space and I'd say not in a private residence you're planning to sell.

I wouldn't buy it without one, no matter how "pretty" it is.

It's beautiful, but I'm going to have to agree with the others readers that handrails are a must. I don't have stairs in my house, and every once in awhile I'll need to navigate the house in total darkness -- I could see this killing me.

A wall-side railing in that picture, contiguous with the wall and the same colour? I honestly don't think that would disturb things too much, and it would add a lot of accessibility.

No one is kltuz-proof. And I don't care how ugly you think rails are. They're there for a very good reason (says the pregnant lady who fell down the stairs while the landlords had them removed for refinishing and had to go to the hospital). Even graceful people trip sometimes. And then you've got the waste of a trip to the hospital. How is that green? Design is nice (says the former BFA student). But it is not so important that it should trump everything else.

An architect's goal is to find the optimum balance between users' many conflicting desires. Many clients take handrails as a given, but others don't see safety or accessibility as a priority, and instead value the clean aesthetic of a stair without rails. For some buildings (ie homes) where the client is the primary and sometimes only user, if they don't want handrails, I see no problem. In buildings where non-client users will interact with the building, safety and accessibility are obviously higher priorities. And the system bears this out: as soon as the inspector leaves, the owner can make all kinds of changes, including removing handrails and putting furniture in front of fire exits. They open themselves up to liability, but if they're the only ones using the space, they accept that risk. If they're not, they are likely to be reported for code noncompliance and then they'll be required to fix the issue.

Long post to say... what's the big deal? None of the commenters here want to live in a house without handrails, so I'll wager they never will. Other people have other priorities and desires.

BTW, it's the client whose desires dictate the final design, not the architect's. I'm confused by everyone here who seems to feel that inaccessible design is being foisted upon unsuspecting homeowners by incompetent architects. If the client wasn't darn sure they wanted a staircase without rails, they wouldn't go through the trouble and expense of making it happen.

As someone who is designing her own green home I think that some code restrictions are silly (fight past red tape so I can have a composting toilet?) But the need for a handrail is a necessity. Even if I didn't have knack for slipping down stairs (I have to have a firm grip on the handrail to feel secure) I would still have a handrail for safety's sake.

You don't mean to fall down the stairs; that's why they're called accidents. If someone chooses to have a staircase without handrails I see it like driving without your seatbelt on. Something out of your control can happen and put you in danger.

Thinking that you'll never need a handrail in your home is sort sighted, narrow minded and selfish. How can you be sure that there will never ever be a visitor or occupant in the house who has mobility problems, who may be elderly, injured, pregnant, or in some other way needing a balustrade, railing or barrier. How can the owner be certain that they won't twist your ankle some months down the track and require the aid of a rail to climb up the stairs?
I've never understood this obsession for stairs without railings that gets peddled on Treehugger, and I'm glad to read that most other treehugger readers seem to agree with me.

(Finally, isn't it less sustainable to build something which looks pretty, but which needs to be retrofitted down the track in order to make it safe/functional?)

Aye you also won't be able to insure a home with stairs like that.

Heck, why even have stairs? We'll just all get to the upper level climbing a knotted rope, made of hemp of course. Really, who cares about the elderly and handicapped, they just need to toughen up and should have thought about moving everything downstairs before they got old or crippled.