A practical look at marking and cutting stair stringers for a building project. Focused on the process, tools, and step-by-step craftsmanship. How do you approach stair layout?

"You can absolutely cut a stair stringer if only you only knew the way the math works," my dad once said to me. So, long before I ever had a geometry class, I knew the math behind determining a slope.

You probably give little thought to the stairs you go up or down to reach different levels of your home, deck or patio. I’ll wager that if I handed you a measuring tape, a framing square, a pencil and ...