You've really got to stick the landing.

Great way to give yourself a concussion when getting up to use the john.

Better have your dentist on standby.

What in the name of all that’s holy am I looking at? i agree, a late night potty run could be fatal.

I was expecting to see a ”head” in the nautical sense of the word in the bedroom, which would have been bad. This is soooo much worse! Is the bed up on risers?

How odd.

That's crazy! That bed looks awfully high too.

My eyes are just not seeing right on this! Is the blue area just open? It doesn’t look like a landing to me. Have I correctly identified the first step? Is this owned by someone who is a performer with Cirque du Soleil?

The blue area and to it's right are open. The blue area is where you step down. That thing you asked about being a step is another beam.

This must be a converted space/warehouse.

That thing you asked about being a step is another beam.

Just in case you missed knocking yourself out on the way to the bathroom, you get another chance when going down the stairs.

Real estate…. its a crazy hobby and business.

Seriously, pal, do you know what the story is on this space?

Apparently designed for this gal...

It's as if the space was designed to be all vaulted then at the last minute someone said 'oops we really need another bedroom and bath' and hero builder replies' we can do that!'. Those change orders are wicked.

This is how you get your ab workout……

It's a late 70s early 80s conversion. I think this was a school.

On my old street the houses had either 14 foot or 13 foot ceilings on the first floor and these were routinely lofted in the 1960s. I had a 14 ft version, so I had a kitchen and dining area with 6'6" ceilings and a powder room area/closet with a s 6'6" ceiling.

But up the street there were lofts in the 13 foot buildings that had a kitchen and bath with 6'6" ceiling height and a "bedroom" loft with a 5'6" ceiling, some of these it was a secondary bedroom space but in some of them it was The bedroom space. I am not sure how they got away with it.

I thought it was Photoshopped. Yikes.

I can see a low-ceiling kitchen with loft, though it would be a bit like living in a fancy RV. But these rafters take the cake.

Beyond the obvious, it looks like they tied that beam by the staircase to the massive beam above suggesting that whatever is holding up the floor, it's not adequately supported from below. That would be just another cherry on the sundae for not going there for me.

Actually I think it's because the floating staircase is separate from the loft. There are actually some walls underneath the loft if I remember correctly.

Here is the underneath. The stairs aren't that safe either. Lots of those around here too.

I am very uncomfortable on floating or open stairs, railing or not. It's disconcerting to me.

Is this some sort of S & M room?

No, but I do have a picture of one from a Colorado listing, I will have to look for it.

Wait, now I'm confused. Does that ceiling stop short of the wall so there's headroom to go up the stairs? Or do you have to duck there too?

It does stop short. One thing that happens here (I have had two places with this issue), is that they often cheat the stairs a little bit, making them wide enough to meet code, but the ceiling opening is not quite as wide as the stairs, to gain a few inches of floor space. Sometimes you have to watch your shoulder.

Oh brother! What a nightmare!

Pal, what happened to your last post? That contraption was a Cadillac-Reformer Bundle. Lol, does sort of look like something for bondage.

How can they get by without a railing on that staircase? Unfortunately there are quite a few homes in Philly where the homeowner remodeled without bothering to get a permit. Although in all honesty if you read the Inquirer you'll discover that a permit and building inspection means very little.

@maire_cate, yes...this is a condo, too so I am assuming it was permitted. However I don't know how old it is or how much difference that makes. There are probably hundreds of loft-added conversions existing that do not meet current ceiling height requirements or bedroom egress requirements. But the issue is that to make them code compliant by today's standards, you would actually need to completely reconfigure many properties and change what they were--they would become "smaller". No lofts, not basement bedrooms etc. And of course thousands of 19th c. houses that have staircases which are way out of compliance and could never be rectifed and thousands of houses that could no longer be built because the lot is now too narrow to be considered buildable. As well as our L and I inspection process being broken.

Pal you're right and I should be more aware of that. Until recently all 3 of my adult kids lived in Northern Liberties. 2 moved to the suburbs to raise families and only DD is still there. Over the years they looked at any number of homes - row homes, high rises, condos, in-fill and renovated factories. And most definitely had a quirk or 2 or 3.

There’s quirky, then there’s not-to-code, and then there are things like this. Unless the photos are misleading, who would design or live with this?

Well, not me...and this is pretty extreme. But many people live with ceiling heights where they have to stoop or box winder stairs that are really pretty dangerous. There are some accommodations that mean you can't really live completely unconsciously, if that makes any sense. Stairs today are designed so we can walk or run up and down without thought, because our brain can program within two steps how we need to go up and down a consistent staircase. One of the things that I was looking for in a house was straight stairs that were regular. And I got lucky except for the basement but it wasn't all that easy.