Stairgate

I can't rave about this product enough! We started with your traditional stairgate, the heavy metal one that you have to step over each time. We had it at the top and bottom of our stairs but it was just a real trip hazard. Although the Lascal one is very expensive it has been the best purchase ever! It folds away nicely so you don't even know it's there, it's strong (yes, our son has been known to swing off it on occasion!) and it's easy to clean. It's also great for peace of mind. When you open it, if you don't hold the 'switch' down properly it makes a loud 'zipping' noise - peace of mind if you're in the house by yourself and worried about someone trying to get in.

Bit fiddly to assemble but great for our non-standard space

We have wide curving stairs as nothing else would fit. We still had to get our handyman to put in a wooden post to fix it to as our metal newel posts are narrow and not too robust
Pricey, but great if you:
- have a wide or awkward space
- dont want a bar to trip over at the base
- want to be able to hide your gate when no kids around
I can manage to open it one handed some of the time but the mechanism could be improved. And if you want it to close without a noise after youve put dc to bed then its a 2 handed job.

This is a brilliant product. I have one on stairs and another to seperate our open-plan kitchen and dining room when I am cooking etc.
There is no bar to trip over when you go through, and best of all when it is rolled back you hardly know it is there. Strongly recommend it.

You don't realise what a good idea it is to have a gate without a bar at the bottom until you have one with a bar and continually trip over it! Slightly expensive and a little bit tricky to fit but well worth it.

fantastic product, really discreet when not in use and really safe (lo's take longer to figure it out!!)

Good for difficult spaces. Not easy to open and shut - I definately can't do it with one hand or while holding a baby. It comes with two sets of wall attachments - so we used it to cover the bottom of the stairs or the width of the hallway to stop the dog from getting out if the front door is open.
Expensive for an everyday stairgate but great for awkward spaces.

We have a modern split level house, with lots of steps. We bought four of these and found them ingenious. Our spaces were wider than normal, so these were only ones that fit, but they also looked the best, when open and closed. We have white walls so they really were quite subtle, and the fact that they retract with no frame at bottom was ideal. Only one still in action on main stairs now, but have passed on the rest to a friend. Definitely a 2 handed job to open, and a little knacky initially.

I think this is wonderful. We have a tiny landing at the top of the stairs and any other gate wouldn't have worked. It's a lot sturdier than it looks too and my little one has banged on it a lot and it's held up so far.

The downside to it is that I can't open it one handed, so with baby & toddler I have to take the toddler downstairs then go back up for baby.

Also you must make sure that both top and bottom latch are in place otherwise a wily toddler will slip under it...

It screws into the wall, so some basic diy skills are needed to fix it on.

These are great - especially for the top of the stairs. There is no bar to trip over - and when not in use it rolls back to the side out of sight, and out of the way. We also use one of these to stop our dogs getting to shoes and coats in our understairs cupboard!

Not the cheapest of stairgates, but I now wouldn't use anything else at the top of the stairs.

An absolutely brilliant gate. It might be the most expensive around -

This was the only stairgate that we could have used for a difficult space - at the top of 3 stairs, but with a sort of diagonal gap, so impossible to fill with a rigid design. Initially it was quite hard to open/close one-handed but I soon got to grips with it and have passed it onto a friend.