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jason_carlton26

Deck banister without blocking my views

In September I had a tree hit my house, and it damaged part of the deck banister. This is from last night, taken through my kitchen window:



Beyond the deck is a goldfish pond and flower garden. I'm also working to move the fence 20' farther back so that I can have a lot more garden.


But this damage has made me realize that the banister was completely blocking my view!


So now what? I don't know that I want to eliminate banisters entirely. Is there something that would work better that wouldn't block my view?

Comments (10)

  • PRO
    Joseph Corlett, LLC
    last year

    Glass panels, but big $$.

  • Sigrid
    last year

    You can put in wires for rails, but you'll still have the top rail. What I've seen done is to make a step or two down, so that the rails are lower than where you sit. For example, to have the far end of your deck a step or two down from the main deck.

  • Jason, zone 7A, near Greensboro NC
    Original Author
    last year

    I like where you're going with that, @Sigrid.


    Following that train of thought, maybe I could hire someone to cut that 90 degree angle into two 45 degree angles, then build steps that wrap all the way around the corner.


    Something like this:



    That would require some work to overhaul part of my garden, though, and I'd definitely need to hire someone instead of doing it myself. But it would definitely open it up! So maybe.

  • btydrvn
    last year

    Take another picture from as far back as possible …in the daylight,,,to portray your situation more clearly and fully..

  • Jason, zone 7A, near Greensboro NC
    Original Author
    last year

    Right now the deck is a mess from the tree damage, but I'll do what I can to give you an idea of what I have :-)


    These two pics were taken from my kitchen window today at noonish. I'm inside of the kitchen with the phone against the window, so this is about as far back as I can get:



    This is from last year, standing on the deck with the kitchen window directly to my left (facing West):


    These next two are from previous years, facing East. You can see the kitchen window on the right of the first pic, just above the loveseat:




    These next 3 pics are of my pond and garden just past the banister, taken last year:




    The pond and garden is obviously a work in progress, I work on this as a stress reliever from work so they're always growing and changing. But I've discovered that I hate blocking the view to the fruits of my labor!

  • PRO
    GN Builders L.L.C
    last year

    Use a Plexiglass panel for that or a few railing sections and down the road them all.

  • charles kidder
    last year

    I would put in steps. I would guess people would be drawn to the water feature and want to step down to check it out. You could do the steps yourself if you had basic woodworking skills. Not complicated at all. Assuming you would only need 2 steps. Not much worry of someone getting hurt if you screw it up.

  • Jason, zone 7A, near Greensboro NC
    Original Author
    last year

    I'm kind of leaning that way, too, @charles kidder. The Plexiglass panels would be great, but that gets cost prohibitive :-/ Plus, I have to pressure wash algae off of the deck annually, so I can't even imagine how much work it would be to keep the glass clean!


    I'm good with woodwork, but for this I'd want to chop off that corner and have two 45 degree angles instead of one 90 degree angle. That means that I'd need to put in two new support beams and dig out the existing one.


    I could do it, but considering how much time I'll already be spending on digging up plants and relocating them I just don't have enough time for it all!

  • fnmroberts
    last year

    Tempered Glass on ours. West facing and stays pretty clean naturally. Have had ot in place over 20 years. To me a much better option than Plexiglass.


  • cyn427 (z. 7, N. VA)
    last year

    Cable railing will not block your view and you can have minimal metal railings and posts.