Newport mansion revives 1500s staircase craft with mortise-and-wedge joinery

The project’s heart is a dramatic helical staircase with laminated curved stringers and mortised-and-wedged treads and risers. As per reports, the technique originated in the construction of European staircases in the late 1500s, when wealthy homes and castles had elaborate staircases. A stairway goes up to nowhere in a woodshop. No grand foyer at the bottom, no upper floor waiting at the top—just a full-scale helical structure surrounded by tools, machinery, and carefully prepared pieces of wood. But this unfinished staircase is also something much more: an intersection of centuries-old craftsmanship and contemporary engineering. Wondering what it is? Well, there is a stairway being built for the restoration of a historic home in Newport, Rhode Island. It is a Mark Richey Woodworking’s design and a revival of a late 16th century European method of building stairs, and uses modern computer modeling and manufacturing technology to achieve accurate results. According to an online report by Markrichey website, Newport is known for its grand Gilded Age homes, famously and somewhat facetiously referred to as “summer cottages.” Buildings like The Breakers, Miramar and Hammersmith Farm he...