Thank you, Dorin; I appreciate your help. But there are some significant flaws in your design. The rise of the staircase in my case is 3270 mm; in your design, the staircase has 16 risers—that’s 204 mm per step (that’s too high!). Right at the bottom, there’s a major obstacle to this calculation. On the fifth step, the height will be 102 cm, and the clearance under the overhanging beams of the upper structures will be 189 cm. This is unacceptable for a person walking up the staircase—they’ll hit their head on the beam. I’d already sketched out various combinations, and I needed a design with at least 18 flights to clear the crossbeams, but with 18 steps, the step depth became very dangerous for a person’s foot (about 23 cm deep, which is too shallow for safe movement). Therefore, I stated that building a staircase under these conditions was impossible. The builders, however, proposed—and, most importantly, actually cast—a fan-shaped structure where the foot always rests on a wide surface, at an angle to the step, and is always fully supported on the step. This is a very interesting solution, and a straight layout is not possible due to other constraints (the crossbeams in the upper rooms). Therefore, I view this project as an artistic solution that cannot be approved under building codes. But the fact is—people actually live in this house and are happy with their lives and their unusual staircase. If building codes for staircases had been strictly followed under these conditions, they would most likely have had to tear down the house and start from scratch, beginning with the staircase. But the house had already been purchased with its unknown issues! What a nightmare. And what a triumph of the imagination of simple artists without professional training. I don't know—maybe the owners won't be able to sell their house for a long time, I don't know. But they themselves are happy and content right now. Yes, I fully understand that the ingenuity and efforts of ordinary people are often amusing and comical, and I understand that a professional’s work is always reliable and well-reasoned. But there are situations in life when unconventional solutions are far more important than norms and rules. In Antoni Gaudí’s time, such ideas were more important than tables and rules. I keep thinking about this now, when everything is under the control of smarter directors... Things used to be different, and now the whole world admires the Sagrada Família, where there are no rules. But I agree—it’s best not to mess around with stairs.
