The first thing you need to determine is what type of finish os on the rail. Shellac strips with denatured alcohol. Lacquer is lacquer thinner. Varnish requires either methylene chloride (fast & somewhat dangerous) or one of the new 'safe' strippers (though they have a real hard time with some varnishes). Stripping interior wodwork during the winter is usually a bad idea. Spinrg, fall, and open windows are a better choice.

I don't have a picture, but our floors are white oak with a clear finish. Our handrails are red oak, with a mahogany stain and amber shellac finish. The handrails are attached to the walls with black wrought iron brackets. Our handrails match the baseboard molding in the staircase and throughout the house...all stained. We're very happy with how it looks.

I think the rails s/b the same look as your floors for the best results IMO. White balusters to compliment the look would be stunning IMO. Try L.J. Smith for the best selection of products to use. Cumaru can probably be custom made but would be very expensive. LJ Smith has several choices in various woods and various prices. We put in antique heart pine floors and to have custom rails made from the same materials was going to be outrageously expensive. I selected several good hard woods that stain well and got some samples of maple and poplar. I then mixed my own stain, trial and error in small amounts recording the ratio of parts and stained the samples until I got a good match. In the end, I found poplar was easiest to match in my case. I then handed everything over to the painter and he stained and finished the rails and they match perfectly! The final finish is Waterlox. Waterlox is a tung oil based varnish product that is very durable and very suitable for a handrail. It will protect against oils, dirt etc and cleans up quite well. I know it seems odd that i mixed my own stain but it is not that hard and it was the only way I could be sure I was happy with the color. In short, insted of telling the painter "how about trying a little more of this color and see" I just looked at it and used my own judgement (and time and patience). BTW, I recommend oil based gel stains. This was the first time I had used the gel stains and I found them to be quite nice to use and very forgiving (even for my painter). Also, I had read a lot about preconditioning wood before staining. I found maple and poplar to stain very evenly and well and took on a much more rich look without using a wood conditiner. Sorry for the long winded response but I hope it helps. Having been there and done that, I know something like a hand rail seems like such a little thing but it makes such a powerful statement when done well.

We did not used a painted/stained combo, but strictly stained. Disclaimer: We did not stain anything ourselves, but paid a finisher to do it before install. We used 'rustic' cherry stained quite dark for all our interior trim, including our wood handrails. Since the entire 1st floor minus office is 'rustic' Maple, Treads and risers are also Maple, stained the same dark color. Balusters are wrought iron. I would say on a scale of 1 to 10 (with 10 being the darkest stain possible before looking black) our cherry trim is probably a 7. Grain pattern is present but not overwhelming, it tends to be tighter on cherry than oak, hickory, or walnut. Our Cherry is not red-hued whatsoever, because its too dark. We had no issue with staining Maple, even though I have heard some on here mention it is impossible to stain Maple dark because it is such a hardwood. A good finisher will know what to do and should have no issues. I say 'rustic' because we requested wood with knots and such, to add more character and we wanted the cherry to match better with our knotty alder interior doors.