Baby gate solutions for bottom of stairs/with 1 wall

[Susie]

With DD, we never gated off the bottom of the stairs.  We have a gate at the top, and then we just gated the kitchen so she was limited to the back half of the house (kitchen + family room) and out of the foyer entirely.  That solution worked fine when we were just home on weekends.  

We're now home all the time (obviously), and we're working in living/dining room with DS crawling around those rooms while we work.  My desk is the one in sight line of the stairs, and watching the stairs is just too much responsibility while I'm trying to WFH.  He learned to crawl since we've been home, so we need to gate them off now.

We have a swinging gate at the top of the stairs, but I'm not sure that will work well here.  I'm sure MMM has already invented this wheel.  What works best for this kind of wall/banister situation?  Or should we gate off the wide doorway from LR to foyer instead?  That would achieve the same thing because the (LR/DR) is already gated off from the kitchen.

[sdlaura]

We have the same situation, and my DH built something on the bannister side. He took two long thin pieces of wood and bolted them around the last banister rail, so that we could attach the other side of the baby gate to it. I would take a picture for you, but we just took it down so I could paint our bannister, and haven't put it back up yet.

[ssmjlm]

They make gates that attached to a wall and also a bannister. We had one like that at the bottom.

Amazon shows a few options: www.amazon.com/Regalo-Stairs-Banister-Mounting-inches/dp/B003VNKLIE/ref=sr_1_23?crid=2CV0OQHYO2UXI&dchild=1&keywords=banister+to+wall+baby+gate&qid=1588192904&s=baby-products&sprefix=wall+to+bann%2Cbaby-products%2C172&sr=1-23

ETA: We gate the bottom of our stairs now due to the dog and it's actually a 6 panel gate DH made that we took 2 panels off and just L shape it at the bottom.  Probably won't work for a mobile baby, but they do have some 3 panel freestanding ones on amazon too.

[Susie]

I’m familiar with a lot of the options and adapters available for single wall stairs generally, we have one at the top:



But one of the things that’s different about the bottom is that we need the gate to fit (and swing, if it’s a swinging gate) under the banister, whereas at the top of the stairs the gate is beyond the end of the banister.  The bottom gate hinge would be pretty close to the bottom banister bracket.  If it swings out over the foyer floor, it will probably hit the banister when it opens wide.  Is there a way to avoid that weird interference?

e.g., the one ssmjlm linked is 35" tall.  We only have roughly 32" between the top of the step and the banister at the midpoint of the stair even with the (rickety, skinny metal) newell post.  When that gate swings out toward the foyer, the banister will be even lower at that point, so a gate that's 32" or near that would not fit under it.

This seems like it would be easier if we had an actual newell post that was even with the floor instead of the bottom step, but we need a "now" solution for safety.  This is why I was wondering if just gating off the doorway from the LR to foyer would be easier.

[aprilsails]

At our last house we had a crazy curve at the bottom of the stairs that finished at the front door so it wasn’t possible to put in a gate that could open all the way.

We installed a retractable mesh gate (don’t have to worry about falls at the bottom of the stairs) about 4 or 5 steps up past the crazy curve. DD could climb up the few stairs but she never fell down badly from that height and we had a carpet down at the bottom. So I would just attach it at the walled part and call it a day.

[joy]

You can zip tie the other side of a mesh gate to the wire bannister.

We have this set up, as well.

[boiler717]

What about a L or U shape gate that mounts into the wall in front of the stairs and on the side of the wall supporting the stairs? You could do freestanding, too.

[UMaineTeach]

we has bigger wooden post, so H attached a board to it and installed the gate.

If I was you I would just gate to wide door and not mess around with trying to cobble together a stair gate.

[starryfish]

I would do the retractable mesh gate

[Blue Moon]

Get this: retract-a-gate.com/prices-buy-retractable-safety-gate?gclid=Cj0KCQjwy6T1BRDXARIsAIqCTXqXMdllkCKTpK_R1tuvaU_yMYh81GCGA2zQgEB9T9AmomPnOAPgkD0aAjMsEALw_wcB

Totally worth it.

[Susie]

Ooh a retractable gate that isn't super loud? That's awesome. I'm thinking that would be easier to do across the wide doorway from LR to foyer... and then I would not have to worry about DS pulling the plug-in carbon monoxide detector out of the wall, or grabbing shoes left by the front door, etc.

I bought a different retractable gate for the top of the stairs at my dad's beach house. Maybe not perfect, but there isn't room at the top of the stairs for a swinging gate. Good in theory but the mechanism is so freaking loud, I hate using it when the kids are sleeping. One that is quiet would be amazing.

[lessel]

In a previous thread where I asked a somewhat similar question, I posted a couple pictures of the set-ups in our house: pandce.proboards.com/thread/616040/proofing-stair-question-update-thread

ETA: Our retractable gate is pretty quiet unless you're a 5yo who just lets it fly and slam closed.