Marble Stairs: Treads, Risers, Skirting and Measurements

The parts of a step: tread, riser and skirting

Every step has three named parts. The tread is the flat part you walk on. The riser is the vertical face between two treads. The skirting is the strip that runs up the wall beside the stairs and protects the plaster from shoes and mopping. Add the landing, the flat platform between two flights, and the nosing, the front edge of the tread that sticks out over the riser.

Each part does a different job. The tread carries weight and wear, the riser is mostly for looks, and the skirting is protection. So the three do not have to be the same thickness, or even the same stone, which gives you room to choose without giving up strength.

Usual thicknesses: 3 cm treads, 2 cm risers

Common practice in Egypt is to cut treads at 3 cm, because they take footfall and knocks, and risers at 2 cm, because they carry no load. This is a habit, not a rule. Some stones come in slabs of other thicknesses, a narrow indoor flight can take a thinner tread, and some engineers ask for thicker treads on wide flights or building entrances.

Skirting is usually the riser thickness or thinner, and is fixed to the wall, not the floor. When you compare two quotes, check both assume the same tread and riser thickness; 2 cm or 3 cm on the tread changes the whole sum. The thicknesses available for each stone are in our thickness and edges guide.

The tread edge: bullnose or square?

The most common tread edge in Egypt is the half-round, or bullnose. It does not chip easily under shoes and is kind to bare feet. There is also the square edge with a small chamfer for a modern look, and the full round for grander staircases.

The tread usually overhangs the riser by two or three centimetres. That nosing is the weakest point of the step, so do not push it further than needed, and do not choose a brittle stone for it. In a flat with small children, a rounded edge is safer than a sharp one. Ask for the edge to be polished to the same sheen as the surface so the join does not show.

Anti-slip: grooves, honed and flamed

Polished marble looks beautiful on stairs but is slippery when wet, especially at the entrance in winter. The usual answer is grooves: two or three lines cut along the tread near the edge that grip the shoe without changing the look of the stone. They can be cut in the workshop before fitting or on site after polishing.

For outdoor steps and building entrances, granite with a honed (matt) or flamed (heat-roughened) finish is the better choice, because the texture itself stops slipping and no grooves are needed. Marble is not normally flamed, as the heat weakens it, so on marble stick to honed or grooves. All the finishes are explained in our finishes guide.

Which stones survive a building's stairs?

A shared staircase takes hundreds of steps a day, furniture and wet shoes, so it needs a hard, low-porosity stone. Granite is the toughest: it resists scratches and stains far better than marble, and suits entrances and shared flights. Among Egyptian marbles, Galala and Triesta are widely used on building stairs, as their colour is even and a textured finish hides wear. They are still marble: seal them, and add grooves or a honed face.

Avoid soft or porous stones, and anything with large veins that can snap at the edge. Avoid onyx altogether: a decorative, semi-translucent stone that scratches and wears quickly underfoot; it belongs on walls and backlit features. Our beige marbles guide compares Galala, Triesta and Silvia.

Indoor villa stairs or outdoor steps?

An internal villa or duplex staircase is used only by the household, so the choice widens: a lighter marble, a stone with bolder veins, or a polished finish with light grooves, provided the stone is sealed regularly if it absorbs. Granite here is a safe option, not a necessity.

Outdoor steps, entrance stairs and garden steps face sun, rain and sand. They want granite in a honed or flamed finish, laid with a slight fall outwards so water does not sit on the tread. Marble outdoors loses its shine and stains faster, especially near the sea. Our North Coast and outdoor guide goes into stone for open spaces.

Keeping the colour even along a long flight

A staircase is one long piece seen in a single glance, so a colour shift between steps shows far more than it would on a floor. Marble is natural: one slab differs slightly from the next, and more between batches. Ask for all the treads of one flight to be cut from consecutive slabs of the same batch, and have that written into the quote.

Granite and stones with little veining are easier to keep even. Strongly veined stones need arranging: the treads are laid out in order in the workshop, numbered, then fitted in that order. Seeing the slabs yourself in the showroom before cutting beats judging from a photo.

Stair skirting: stepped or sloped?

Stair skirting has two shapes. Stepped skirting follows the outline of the steps up the wall, one piece per tread and one per riser; the most common in apartment buildings, cut from offcuts and simple to fit. Sloped skirting is one continuous band at the angle of the flight; it looks cleaner in villas but needs precise cutting and a flat wall.

The usual height matches the floor skirting on the same level, so the two lines meet at the landing. Say whether the stairs are open on one side (one wall of skirting) or between two walls (two runs); it changes the quantity. If a handrail is fixed into the treads, say where, so the holes are planned.

How stairs are measured

Measuring a staircase is simple if you work in order. Count the steps in each flight, then measure the width from wall to wall or wall to balustrade, then the tread depth (edge to edge) and the riser height. Note the number of landings and the size of each, and the shape of the stairs: straight, L-shaped or a full turn.

Remember that a flight usually has one more riser than treads, because the last riser meets the landing. Do not worry if one step differs from another by a centimetre; stairs in older buildings are rarely even, and we take the final measurements on site, step by step, before cutting. The general method is in our how-to-measure guide.

What to send on WhatsApp

Send one or two photos of the stairs, the number of steps in each flight, the width, the tread depth and riser height, the number and size of landings, and whether skirting goes on one wall or two. Add whether the stairs are indoor or outdoor, building or villa, the floor and whether there is a lift, and any stone you like.

We reply with a written quote covering stone, tread and riser thickness, edge shape, grooves, skirting and fitting. The price depends on the stone, thickness, finish and site conditions, so only compare two quotes that state all four. The showroom in El Deresa, Moharram Bey is open Saturday to Thursday if you want to see the slabs first.