This build set massive natural flagstone slabs into the grade, step by step, and finished the run with a steel railing fabricated and welded on-site. Stone from the mountains, rail from our shop, one staircase that belongs to the land it sits on.
Slabs, not slices
The material choice drives everything else here. These are full flagstone slabs — each one a tread — rather than thin stone laid over poured steps. Working at that scale means every stone is placed by machine and judged by eye: thickness varies, faces vary, and the craft is selecting and seating each slab so the run reads as consistent even though no two stones are alike.
Set into a compacted, drained base, slab treads have a mass that keeps them where they were put. That matters on a Montana slope, where freeze-thaw works on every joint and light construction walks downhill a little every spring.
A railing from our own shop
A staircase this size on open grade needs a rail, and a stock railing would have fought the stone. This one was fabricated by our welding crew and fitted on-site to the actual geometry of the finished steps — which is the only way a railing follows hand-set stone gracefully, because the stone was never going to follow a drawing.
That is the practical advantage of stone and steel coming from one crew: the railing was planned with the staircase rather than measured up afterward.
Built into the grade, not onto it
Steps on a slope succeed underground. The excavation, the compacted base under each tread, and the drainage that keeps water from undermining the run are the parts no photo shows — and they decide whether a staircase is still even in ten years. It is the same physics as every hard surface we build in this climate: what is underneath is the project.
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