Hello everyone,
We are expecting a child and have an open staircase with steel stringers (see pictures).
Sorry that the pictures are not up to date: the intermediate sections are now filled with glass, as you can probably imagine.
Now I have the following problem: which type of stair safety railing could I install here? On the right side, I could attach it to the wall – but on the left side, apart from the glass elements, there is unfortunately nothing to attach to...
If I want to install the safety railing on the first step (which might be possible with some tweaking), then I would have the problem that the gap at the lowest step is too wide – meaning I would need to position the railing all the way at the bottom. Unfortunately, there is no surface to fix it on the left side there.
Do you have any ideas, or have you perhaps been in the exact same situation and found a suitable solution? I would appreciate any advice or tips!
We are expecting a child and have an open staircase with steel stringers (see pictures).
Sorry that the pictures are not up to date: the intermediate sections are now filled with glass, as you can probably imagine.
Now I have the following problem: which type of stair safety railing could I install here? On the right side, I could attach it to the wall – but on the left side, apart from the glass elements, there is unfortunately nothing to attach to...
If I want to install the safety railing on the first step (which might be possible with some tweaking), then I would have the problem that the gap at the lowest step is too wide – meaning I would need to position the railing all the way at the bottom. Unfortunately, there is no surface to fix it on the left side there.
Do you have any ideas, or have you perhaps been in the exact same situation and found a suitable solution? I would appreciate any advice or tips!
kati1337 schrieb:
We took a completely unorthodox approach and just decided to skip the stair gate. 😀
Babies and toddlers go through different stages, and during the first few months, there’s no need to stress about it since they aren’t mobile yet. Once they start crawling, you’ll quickly reach a point where you either a) need to supervise them closely, or b) keep them within a “safe space” like a larger playpen or similar.
I wasn’t a fan of the playpen idea at first, until we had a child. We ended up getting one fairly quickly because kids don’t experience it as “prison-like” the way we adults might — ours always really enjoyed it, happily played inside, and often even fell asleep there.
We never missed the classic stair gate since, in the hallway area, there were already too many things that weren’t childproof. So we either stayed very close to our child or made sure they had no access to the hallway.
When he got older, we eventually installed a pressure-mounted gate at his bedroom door. We childproofed the room so he could safely stay and play there alone, and the gate in the door made sure he couldn’t get to the stairs or other areas that weren’t suitable for children. This was a pretty specific case though, as our son was quite independent early on and generally not very clingy. From what I hear from friends, that’s not always typical.
Just sharing this as food for thought — it doesn’t have to fit your plans, of course. Edit: Even without a stair gate, we apparently were still a bit too cautious — at some point a caregiver at daycare mentioned that we should encourage him to use the stairs more at home, because he seemed afraid of them there. 😀
Depending on how early your child will be cared for outside the home and how that is handled, you might have to quickly let go of the “keep kid away from stairs” idea anyway.
By the way, I would be less worried about the child falling down the steps themselves and more concerned about the child falling through the gaps below the handrail if there is no glass there, while glass is installed elsewhere. This difference might not be visually obvious to the child.
Yosan schrieb:
And why exactly is it not possible at the lower end like in the picture, where it rests on the bottom step?I think it is possible, but the concern was that someone might crawl underneath the lowest step. At least, that’s how I understood it.mayglow schrieb:
I think that’s possible, but the concern was that someone might crawl under the lowest step. At least, that’s how I understood it.That explains it. I didn’t understand the problem for a long time either. If there are two bearing surfaces under the step, there are clamp curtain rods that could be screwed in between there.kati1337 schrieb:
That explains it. I didn’t understand the problem for a long time either. If there are two bearing surfaces under the step, there are these clamp curtain rods that you could screw in between.That was exactly the reason—the lowest step.
However, there are tricky solutions with telescopic rails, etc.—and we actually don’t have a problem there.
We do see an issue at the house entrance between the stair railing and the glass panel.
I haven’t come up with a “nice” solution for this yet 🙁
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