Larchmont, New York [US]

EeStairs + Ike Baker Velten

The staircases in this palatial nine-bedroom waterside home in the exclusive Larchmont enclave north of New York reflect the architect’s interest in highly detailed, finely crafted joinery, and this helps the stairs to blend with exposed wooden structural beams in the interiors.

The crucial detail in the main staircase is the way the dark wenge hardwood balusters ‘peg’ seamlessly into the natural white oak hand rails. The balusters slot in with complete precision, as shown by the smooth top surface of the handrails. In this way, the house owners and their guests are touching perfect surfaces. EeStairs also made and fitted the matching balcony balustrades.

The secondary staircase is differently designed. Here, there are deep wooden stringers and closely spaced oak balusters. The subtle ‘turns’ in the stairs produced an unusual geometry, which required great care to ensure than the edge-lines of the folds in the stepped soffit were absolutely accurate.