The Great Stair at Kedleston Hall

One of the wonderful architectural features at Kedleston Hall is the Great Staircase. The house has other good stone staircases but the Great Stair is a particularly ambitious and daring example of a cantilevered staircase. The National Trust, which owns the building, was concerned about its condition and access to several storage rooms around the top landing had become restricted. An exercise was undertaken to understand the defects in the Great Stair and to consider the movement of people and objects around the house. Rather than the imposition of modern codes, which are not always appropriate for historic structures, a well-thought out strategy was implemented, the result of which is that the National Trust now has the use of all the storage rooms in the house and the Great Staircase’s full architectural impact can continue to be appreciated, without the need for unnecessary structural intervention.

Figure 1 Bottom flight of the Great Stair, Kedleston Hall (National Trust).

Figure 4 Historical drawing of Adam’s first design for the Great Stair (NTPL/John Hammond).

Figure 5 Historical drawing of Adam’s amended design for the Great Stair (NTPL/John Hammond).

Paul Ragsdale BEng(Hons), MIStructE, CEng

Paul Ragsdale is a Project Director at Alan Baxter, having graduated from the University of Warwick with a degree is Civil and Structural Engineering. He is particularly interested in work on historic and listed structures, and has worked on various major buildings including the Palace of Westminster and St Paul's Cathedral.

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Donhead Publishing 2010