Marc Maiorana is a metal artist/blacksmith from Virginia who is doing the custom stair rails for both pods. I covered his previous visit in an earlier post. Now that the stairs have been finalized Marc came down to make his final measurements, build his templates, and continue to brainstorm with Ellen and I on design issues.
The current design concept is to have a continous top rail comprised of two different diameter barstock pieces to form an abstracted trapezoidal cross section. This would be welded to verticals comprised of two equal diameter rods of different lengths that Y to meet the top rail. Panels of a material to be determined would be used for infill.
On the main stair the verticals would penetrate the overhanging stair treads and be attached to the side of the stringer. There will be a step down in rod size at the top of the tread so the hole will be covered. In the guest pod the rod stock will be flattened at the 1/4" overhang of the tread and again attach to the side of the stringer
Marc was here all day and actually ended up building his final templates about 9pm by worklights. We made great progress and decided on the exact location of all the verticals and made many refinements in the details of the rail and attachment. Marc and I are doing research on panel materials and we are considering everything from furniture grade maple panels to match the stairwell millwork, metal mesh, high density polyethylene, polycarbonate, and 3Form resin sheets. Glass was out of reach budgetwise.
The template building process that Marc has developed over time was fascinating to watch. Using scrap 2x4s he carefully documents the angles and size of each tread/riser combo and scribes and notates all over them.
He also used this hinged MDF apparatus to get the relative angle and position of the two flights in the main stair.
He plans to fabricate the entire rail in his shop in Virginia and bring it to the site in 3 pieces. The level of accuracy required is unbelievable and how he gets a finished stair rail out of a pickup truck full of 2x4 templates is beyond me but I was absolutely convinced that it would happen.
Marc is such a treat to work with and resonates so much with our desire to collaborate with artists to surround ourselves with beautiful forms and great design. He also makes a beautiful line of metal pieces for the home through his design firm Iron Design . He should be done with the rails in about a month--stay tuned.
Comments