To paint the stairs or carpet them?

[DesolateWaist]

I quite like paint but I worry that they will be slippery.
Does anyone have painted stairs? Do you slip on them?
I am generally either barefoot or in socks around the house.

Show me pictures of your beautiful stairs.

[Muddle2000]

No photos I am afraid. Afraid of slipping? How quickly do you run upstairs?! it depends if the rest is carpeted or not as it may look odd?
Carpet gives noise insulation and it also protects the actual stairs.
If you paint it I suppose it is much cheaper if you then want to change the colour....

[OutOfTime]

We have painted stairs! They look lovely BUT the DC and me keep slipping down them and they are very noisy in the night or early morning when dh is going out to work .. I lay in terror at the creaking waking up the dc at 5am

To summarise they look good, are easy to keep clean but we are having carpet put down in a few weeks !

[TeaRexit]

We had painted stairs. I slipped off the top one, ended up at the bottom then a on a spinal board in an ambulance.

It took me about 6 months to recover from fractures & I was pregnant.

I went in seconds, please be careful!

Im not usually so doom & gloom!

[ThumbWitchesAbroad]

Always had carpeted stairs in my home, but a boyfriend's family had wooden boards (stained, not painted). Slipped regularly on those in socked feet, never fell luckily.

But more than just the slipping, which you can guard against on a daily basis, the noise of uncarpeted stairs would drive me bats. The house next door to mine had uncarpeted stairs, and you could hear every person going up and down the fecking stairs every single fecking time, every single step. Arrrghhhh!

[ThumbWitchesAbroad]

TeaRexit - that sounds dreadful, hope you're ok now? and do you h ave carpeted stairs now?

[bushtailadventures]

Ours are stained rather than painted, have been for years. None of us have fallen down them, but I am considering getting something to put on the treads now dgd is learning to climb the stairs by herself.The risers have pictures on so I don't really want to carpet the whole staircase, if you see what I mean?

[BazHasUnfortunateEyes]

We've just stayed in a holiday house with wooden stairs. They were so unbelievable noisy (especially every time DS thundered down them) and slippy too. I would not consider having wooden stairs now having lived with them. I would imagine they are also very dusty too.

[Itwillbefine]

I would also be wary because of the noise, how about a runner up the stairs?

[DesolateWaist]

Only me and DH so I'm not so worried about noise.
At the moment it's hard floors down stairs with carpeted stairs and landing.

I quite like a stair runner but then I'm not sure how that works at the top of the stairs.

[ThumbWitchesAbroad]

My parents' stairs have a carpet runner - the runner continues at the top of the stairs along the hallway to the door of the bedroom at the back of the house (so the hallway isn't wall-to-wall carpet either)

[Bloodybridget]

We have painted stairs from ground floor to basement (in constant use as kitchen and bathroom down there) and I did slip once but only because I was washing them, barefoot, and turned round carelessly. It has made me nervous and much more cautious! Noise isn't a problem but of course they have to be repainted fairly frequently.