Raising a stairway ceiling

[Torontoite]

The plaster ceiling in the main-to-second-floor stairway in my new home needs to be raised as I cannot walk down the stairway without ducking.

Our plan is to open up a small portion of the ceiling to see if there are any obstructions (i.e. pipes or load-bearing beams) that may impede our work before opening up the entire ceiling.

I'm looking for some advice from other members who may have tackled this type of project before.

[suemarkp]

I'm thinking you're going to find something structural right where your head hits, so moving that may be problematic. Can you backup your stairs one step, so they start earlier and your head is lower when you come to that ceiling?

[Fischer]

This is usually the result of bad planning either by the Architect or the Builder. They ran out of space for the landing at the bottom/top of the stairs. This is usually a tough one to fix as the tolerances are pretty close.

As I'm reading your problem, I'm taking it that the entire ceiling of the stairwell is too low. If that's the case Mark has correctly suggested your main alternative. The other alternative is to increase the height of the risers on your lower staircase if they're not over 7 3/4" (IRC0 8" (UBC) and the treads should be 10" (UBC) 9"(IRC). This will only work if you already have enough head room as you go down the first couple of stairs.