This Odd House - Stairs Project

The house where we live has an unusual history. As we understand it, it was once a one story bathhouse, divided in half for men and women. Then, at some point along the way, they built a single large room atop the bath house. It had a second story entrance through an exterior (covered but not enclosed) staircase. In a third stage of construction, the stairs were enclosed and an arctic entrance that served as the front door to both the upstairs and downstairs was added. So, when we moved in, we had exterior stairs inside our house (see picture above).

The first step in this renovation project was to insulate the stairs. There were gaps as big as 3/4" where the risers met the walls. In the winter, you could feel cold air blowing in through these holes. I used two cans of Great Stuff to fill these gaps.

The next step was to thoroughly sand all the wooden surfaces and patch the damaged wood. It takes a while to sand exterior lumber for interior use. A random orbital sander with shop-vac attachment did a great job of keeping the dust down. I placed the shop-vac outside and fitted an extra long hose to it. This created low pressure in the plastic-enclosed work area that kept air flowing into it (keeping the dust from going into other parts of the house). Also any residual dust that passed through the shop-vac was expelled outside.

Next, I manufactured and fitted trim pieces along the edges of the stairs with a finish nailer. After ensuring that the surfaces were clean and dry, I caulked every possible gap in the wood. Then I taped a border on both walls of the steps.

After giving the caulk ample time to dry, I painted the steps using a burgundy interior/exterior porch and floor paint (designed for heavy duty use). Liz picked the color. We both like it a lot. I applied 3 coats with a day or so between coats, figuring that it was worth a little extra effort now in order to provide a more robust surface down the road.

The result probably won't win any awards, but it is a marked improvement over what was here before. We used donated wood scraps we had on site. And the final product will certainly lead to lower fuel costs down the road.