We love a good staircase. And what better way to celebrate moving into the 15^th year of Symmetrys, than to showcase 15 of our favourites.

This sounded very simple to begin with but it has been far harder to do than we originally expected.  Like the character out of Nick Hornby’s novel High Fidelity questioning the categories of records to establish his Top 10’s, we discussed our staircases endlessly.  Should they be our most fun stairs? (Define fun.) Most sustainable stairs? Most structurally challenging stairs, most affordable..? You can see our dilemma.

In the end there is no science to the stairs showcased; we have simply picked ones that either looked nice, were fun, were structurally challenging and/or were of their time.  For example, some of materials we have used to form stairs have come in and out of fashion.  In the late 90’s we were doing a lot of glass staircases but that fashion seems to have been replaced by exposed stone of late.  We also had a short spate of cladding stairs with leather!!  We’re no architects, but when we looked back at some of those it feels like remembering a bad eighties perm.

What has become clear, however, is that some of our favourites have been the ones that lead you from one space to another in fun way – like the year 5 staircase where a slide for the adults (and occasional child) was constructed alongside the traditional staircase.   A great stair doesn’t always have to appear to oppose all structural engineering logic, it can simply make you feel great when arriving into a space.

To see all 15 staircases, click here. We hope you enjoy them, as much as we have enjoyed going on our small nostalgic journey.  What will our stairs look like over the next 15 years? And will leather be making a comeback?