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4. Maintain Style Two sets of steps help connect this Boston home to its lush front lawn. To keep with the low-slung gambrel-style roof shapes, the design team chose this step configuration, rather than one tall staircase, says Joanne Powell, associate at Jan Gleysteen Architects. It allows the home to sit up on the elevated plane while providing easy access to the street-level lawn.The designers continued the connection from landscape to home by using fieldstone in both the risers and wall along the driveway, and bluestone for the stoops, walkway and patio.
3. Connect With the LandscapeThese smalls steps act as a subtle transition from landscape to homescape, says Peter Budnik, design associate at Wade Weissmann Architecture. “A handshake is often our first experience of a person; the front few steps are often our first tactile experience of a house,” he says. “And just as a handshake is often the basis of our judgments about a person for years to come, the front steps create a lasting impression that’s remembered on some level throughout the rest of the house.“If you’re after a sense of timeless durability, that story begins with the first steps you make up to a house.”To start the story of this home, Budnik used landscape paving to bring the natural surrounds right to the front door. The connection between landscape and house continues with the railing that flares out from the home, welcoming residents and visitors alike. The materials that compose this space, local flagstone pavers and painted iron, integrate the landscape and the architecture, picking up tones from the home’s stone base.
1. Lead to the DoorThe curved shape of these front porch stairs leads guests from the paved driveway to the front door. When designing the steps, Juana Gómez, principal at Lawrence and Gómez Architects, considered the scale and use. The tall roof over the entry, the wide door and the large light fixtures required stairs that fit the grand scale, Gómez says. She decided on 7-foot-wide stairs that fill the space between the columns and stone piers, and added a wrought iron handrail to repeat the curve of the stairs. “They are suitable for everyday access, and also leave space for sitting and talking to the neighbors,” she says.These statement stairs were created from one pouring of colored and stamped concrete. She chose these materials because they were durable and because they complemented the patterns in the stone and the color of the stained wood.Buckwheat concrete color: Solomon Colors; Walnut concrete antique release and Roman Slate concrete texture: Brickform
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