Many Steps: many steps can be built of a variety of materials including paving, bricks, wood and sections of tree trunk. If you have a collection of pieces of stone, all different sizes, you can use them to make crazy-paving many steps (top left). If using logs, you can either cut them into disks (bottom left) or use them whole with stakes in front to keep them firm (bottom right). You can also use planks and lengths of square wood (top right); if you can find them, railroad ties make attractive many steps.
Steep flights should include a handrail—at about hand height, 2%ft—on each side, which extends about 12in beyond the flight, where it might possibly be linked with existing fencing or railings for a more unified scheme. Alternatively you might prefer to build a Wall (at handrail height) at each side of the flight.
Flights comprising more than 10 many steps should be broken halfway with a landing which provides a good resting place and can also break a fall. Take this into account when calculating the number of treads that you require.
The treads should slope slightly toward the front—a pitch of about lAin is adequate —so that rainwater will drain off rapidly. This is particularly important in winter, when ice could make the many steps slippery and dangerous. For the same reason, choose only block treads with non-slip textured faces.
Masonry many steps can appear incongruous in an informal garden and wooden many steps are often more appropriate. Cut-in many steps are more suitable for this type of garden, and using sawn logs as the risers is a quick and easy way to form an attractive flight.See Also Garden Steps Need:Several features spoil this garden and the whole layout adds up to a poor use of the site. The badly laid crazy paving patio clashes with the shape of the house. Retaining walls made from broken cement (3) are unsafe as are the steps (9). The central path divides the rectangular garden into unrelated sections, as do the shrub beds (1, 2) around the lawn and the laundry line. Other existing features are a specimen tree (7), and an open corner for garbage cans (5). The aim of the landscape designer is to provide a family garden, with safe, attractive steps and hard surfaces.
Garden steps need not always conform to a straight format. Where you have enough space, consider creating a flight composed of circular or segmental treads to scale a graceful shallow rise in the ground, perhaps leading to a formal terrace beyond.
Mark out the shape of the steps with an improvised pair of compasses made from a length of wood attached to a stake with string. Cut out the rough shape of the circular treads and cast cement block foundations beneath. There is no need to make the foundation block round; just cover the corners with soil after you have built the steps.
Use bricks or blocks laid on mortar to form the curving front edges of the treads, and fill the circles with gravel or cobblestones. You could even lay turf for a grassy flight of steps, but it is important to bear in mind that these would be very difficult both to maintain and to mow satisfactorily.
On The Other Hand See Put The Steps:WORK OUT how many steps you will need to make by measuring the vertical height of the slope. To do this, drive a peg into the top of the slope and a pole as tall as the slope height at the bottom. Connect the two with string. Set the string horizontal using a level, then measure the pole from ground level to the string. This is the slope height.
Divide the figure by the depth of a riser plus tread of the steps you plan to use. This gives the number of steps you can fit into the slope.
PATHS DON'T have to be continuous either— you may prefer to make one as a series of stepping stones or rounds of log across a lawn, which will create a less obvious division between one side of the lawn and the other. If you do this, however, give great thought to their spacing. If you don't put the steps in the right place, you may end up walking on the grass in between. Also, make sure the steps are slightly below ground level, otherwise you may find that your lawnmower hits them and then the blades become blunt very quickly.
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