Sawn stone steps - or alternatives?

[S60_alex]

Hi all,


I am planning to replace my ageing front steps this summer and am currently reviewing a few options.

Here's a couple of pictures to start:



I had planned to use either York stone or Portland stone and got a few quotes from stone firms for supply.

As a rough guide, I need:

5 of 1500x300 bullnosed treads
5 of 1500x150 risers

As expected, they've come in reasonably high, as below:

Supplier	Portland	York
A	£1,196	£704
B	£2,029	£1,488
C	£1,315	£821

For those of you in the know, do these prices look reasonable? I can get 600x400x25 stone tiles, which I could bullnose myself (I bought the gear to do my bathroom and did about 15 linear metres of polished half bullnose, so am reasonably familiar with this), but would rather have the treads as single pieces, rather than three.

The other issue I'm trying to work out is that once I get to the top of the stairs, I then have a larger flat area of tiling to cover, so if I get sawn stone, I will need to source suitable tiles to cover this with.

Here are a couple of examples of neighbour's houses that I quite like:




Thanks in advance for any opinions or pointers to watch out for!


Alex

 

[jonnyc]

alex
the suppliers who gave you quote for steps /risers will give you a quote for same stone for landingbehind top step.
you are going to find it quite hard to bullnose 30mm yorksanstone unless you are used to doing thsi sort of thing.
try london stone , they do reasonable priced indian sandstone in long pieces and large format stone to go in behind top step.
they also stock alot of it ,so not normal 6-8 weeks if you go for portland.
just dont buy the vey cheapest they offer as this is very porous.
best of luck.
im not interested in fitting but there will be people on here whi could save you a load of grief if this is not your profession.
you laso need to think aboiut damaging a membrane if you have one and there is a celar or such like below.

 

[S60_alex]

Hi John,


Thanks for taking the time to reply - London Stone was actually one of the suppliers I'd been in touch with, so I've asked them also to quote for sandstone as you suggested.

The stairs are over an lowered external area, so there is no membrane or tanking in place to worry about thankfully.


I'll post back to this thread with an update once this job eventually gets done....


Alex