Thanks Kathy for the pictures. Your stairs are beautiful, however I plan to have a light oak stain which I expect will display more of the grain differences between the winder steps and the regular tread steps. I spoke with the carpenter about my wishes/concerns. He will only guarantee the results if I use his original plan for oak flooring on the winder steps. He also does not do the finish work, i.e., staining, painting, varnishing; though he can connect me to people who do this. Is this the usual process? I expected to hire someone to come in and do everything. I visited a new home under construction and viewed his unfinished wood trim work (window trim, door trim, etc.) as well as new staircase. He is very meticulous about his work and got praise from others working on the site (he was not there). One of the reasons I am doing the staircase over is that it is narrow and I need a railing that can be removed when large pieces of furniture need to be moved up/down stairs. He seems to have a good design to handle this problem, so I wasn't expecting to have these concerns about the winder steps. Will using oak flooring on these steps become a resale issue?

Beth H. : - thanks so much for sharing those last two images. I'm working on a staircase in an addition to our old house and I've been using Houzz images to help the staircase maker understand what I'm seeking and hadn't seen those. And I agree, Houzz has chronic "control issues" when it comes to sharing images easily from other sites. I really think the owners have ambitions to take over from Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter, let alone all the also-rans, ugh. It's a sharing world, Houzz - get with the program! Anyway, about those images you've shared; are they from Houzz? I tried clicking on them to see if they'd open a post, to no avail. Thanks!

I get the dilemma. Perhaps you can get 2 pieces of the same wood as your steps and try a walnut stain and a no-stain-just-poly example. I’m torn between keeping the steps being natural with polyurethane or getting them a little darker for maintenance reasons. Steps take a beating, so unless there is a runner in their future (which doesn’t make sense with that gorgeous staircase) I would be concerned about wear and tear. But enough poly on anything is like iron, so going natural would absolutely work. My curiosity would force me to try to match the darkest line in the main floor. And yes, your floors are INCREDIBLE! What a gift to find these under carpeting!

Can you post some photos of the actual space?