Jeff Doubet shares Spanish wall niche and staircase design ideas for high end homes. Before and after photos showcase how Spanish deco tiles, wrought iron railings, hardwood floors and a custom niche transformed the entire heart of a home in Santa Barbara, California.
Spanish Staircase: Before and After
Basic staircases can be completely re-envisioned into stunning works of art. Scroll to see how our team designed and built remarkable results using straightforward techniques and materials. This is how we transformed an ugly, Plain Jane original staircase. We turned it into a graceful, beautiful Spanish-style staircase with an art niche within it.
BEFORE Photo: Here is the original staircase we were starting with. I’m not sure exactly what to call the style… 70’s modern? Short pony walls contained the carpeted steps. On top of the walls, glass panels were secured with wood posts and handrails.
DEMO Day: The glass railing sections have been removed. The design idea was to open up the staircase, exposing each individual stair tread. In other words, seeing “stair steps”, rather than angular walls.
AFTER Photo: The individual stairs are opened up and the wood floors, Spanish blue tiles and wrought iron railings complete the new look.
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Planning a Spanish Wall Niche in an Open Staircase
When designing your own Spanish open staircase, consider including a decorative wall niche in it. This will add warmth and charm to any staircase composition with a similar configuration as ours.
The staircase in this remodel was a perfect spot for a wall niche because: 1) it added interest and detail, and became a new focal point within this home. 2) it would always be enjoyed from many vantage points, including every time the homeowner went up or down the stairs. 3) the underside of our staircase had “extra space”, providing the opportunity to build a deeper niche.
Here the contractor crew carry a Spanish-style barn door past the nearly finished wall niche. Today they are installing the door at the entry to the primary suite bath (on the second level).
Here the wrought iron railing fabricators have arrived and begin installing iron rail sections. These sections were pre-fabricated at their shop. This Artisan welder temporarily tack welds a large rail section into place. Once all panels were perfectly aligned, he made his final welds.
Dramatic staircase transformations can be achieved when you incorporate traditional Spanish-style materials and building methods.
Additional Materials That Look Great With Spanish Interiors
There are a wide variety of special materials I enjoy designing into Spanish home designs. For example, I designed a custom plaster coved ceiling detail specifically for this project. The ceiling needed a defining moment as it transitioned from the entry foyer to the 2 story open staircase.
This photo shows how a simple scroll detail in the design of the iron railing sections tie in and coordinate nicely with the scalloped top of our wall niche.
When designing your own custom wall niche, consider tweaking a classic design. For example, we experimented with different design ideas before we came up with this custom 3 scallop top niche. With scratch paper I worked with our group as we discussed, refined and adjusted an early concept idea. I then mocked up our best idea with red rosin paper before building this final design.
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You can study other implementations of scalloped plaster details within classic Santa Barbara architecture in my blog post Still Admiring Beautiful Santa Barbara Architecture Part 1, here.
More Spanish Wall Niche Photos
Here are some final photos of the custom, three scallop design for our custom Spanish wall niche.
BELOW: A few months after the project was completed, the homeowner shared a photo with me. It highlights how a Spanish home renovation will reveal unexpected benefits for many years to come.
At certain times of the day the sunlight hits the wall just right, accentuating all the craftsmanship that went into creating the composition.
WHERE TO BUY SPANISH Wall NICHES
Perhaps you are a homeowner, designer, architect or builder who does not have the time or budget to design and build a custom Spanish wall niche. Pre-fabricated Spanish wall niches can be purchased directly on Amazon and adapted to custom projects.
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Well friend, this wraps another site visit episode in beautiful Santa Barbara, CA. I hope you enjoyed learning how to infuse more Santa Barbara Style into your own Spanish home design project with wall niches. Scroll to explore more helpful links and resources for designing and building your own Spanish-style home and landscape.
