Six Easy and Cheap Ways to Upgrade Your Staircase

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Many of us have stairs in our home that could use a bit of a makeover, either due to wear and tear over time or because they’re builder-grade basic and didn't have much style to begin with. If you don't want to spend a lot of money upgrading a space meant to simply get you from one floor to another, though, there are ways to jazz your existing stairs without spending a lot.

If you’re suddenly thinking that your boring stairs need a glow-up, here are some ways to accomplish that without cleaning out your bank account.

Paint

Paint is always the easiest and cheapest upgrade you can do, and that applies to your stairs as well. You can easily paint the risers a bold contrasting color that will transform even the most basic stairs into a design element. You can also grab a gallon of floor paint and transform the treads. Doing both together allows you to create a classic black and white look or get creative with a palette that complements the rest of the home’s design.

And don’t forget the railing, balustrades, and newel post—giving these a gleaming new coat of paint is an instant transformation that doesn’t break the bank.

Wallpaper or tile

Your risers offer an incredible design opportunity—they’re essentially tiny canvases that you can dress up in a variety of ways. Applying wallpaper to your risers can give your stairs a punch of color and pattern that will make them pop, and you can probably do the entire staircase with just one roll of paper—or buy some contact paper pieces designed just for this purpose. If you have some leftover tile from another project or a line on some cheap tile, you can also tile your risers just like you’d tile a backsplash, instantly giving them a finished, stylish look.

You’re not limited to the risers, either. You can wallpaper the wall, either covering it completely or creating a “skirtboard” effect that outlines the rise of the steps along the wall. Just bringing color and design into the space will class up your stairs.

Trim

Stair brackets are trim pieces that are attached to the exterior of the stairs, adding some dimension and design to the part of your stairs that people will be staring at when they’re not actively walking on them. They’re pretty easy to install (you can use construction glue if you’re not comfortable with a nail gun or hammering in trim nails) and instantly upgrade the look of the staircase.

You can also add trim to the staircase wall without splashing out. If you’re a decent carpenter, you can create and install a skirtboard along the wall, adding dimension and depth to your stair design. Alternatively (and much more easily) you can grab some stick-on wall trim and create a design on the wall to accent the stairs.

Lighting

Lighting can be a dramatic element in any space, but it’s extra dramatic on stairs—especially at night. Adding some simple stick-on lights to the wall close to the treads not only increases safety, it adds an artistic element, and rechargeable led strips under the lip of the treads turn your boring stairs into a focal point.

Key things to consider when choosing lights are the brightness and warmth of the lights—you want them to be bright enough to increase visibility, but not so bright that they’re distracting. The warmth level should be tailored as much as possible to the palette of your home’s other design features. This might require a bit of experimentation before you land on the perfect combination.

Runners

If your stairs are fine but could use a little nudge of style (and maybe a nudge of safety), adding a carpet runner down the center is an easy project that adds a pop of color and design while increasing the grip. Installing a runner is a pretty straightforward DIY job that shouldn’t take more than a few hours, but you can simplify the task by using stick-on carpet treads instead—not quite as dramatic, but they still add dimension and safety to your stairs.

If you go with a full runner, you can add stair rods pretty easily for an extra pop of design. Stair rods are a classic touch that also helps hold your runner in place so it doesn’t slip and pull over time, which can be both a safety issue and ugly as heck.

Tread caps

You can jazz up builder-basic treads without tearing them out or sanding and staining them by using tread caps. These are thin veneers that slip over your existing treads, instantly hiding defects and changing the whole look and feel of your stairs. This is a fairly easy DIY job, though you’ll need to cut the caps to fit your stairs.

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