Next comes a glimpse - through a locked iron gate - of a majestic staircase flanked by classical statues; a lovely home; a wall, next to the road, topped by a dozen statues of male and female dwarfs.

Ahead rose a narrow staircase, flanked by a small door probably leading to the cellar, while to the left and right were closed doors leading to rooms on the ground floor.

The chapel's rectangular courtyard lies below the level of the roadway and walkway and is accessed by a short staircase flanked by plants, bordered by low walls capped by stonework.

An enchanted staircase, flanked by greenery, leads into a cavern where a golden reclining Buddha lies peacefully next to a glass-walled memorial, dedicated in 2007, filled with the bones and skulls of some of the people bludgeoned to death by Khmer Rouge cadres before being thrown through the overhead skylight.

The production looks good, too, with a grand staircase flanked on one side by the choir in bright African robes and on the other by a white piano on a platform, but the staging was not done with the people in the balcony in mind.

Near the end of the song, Farmer moved toward the staircase flanked by red torches, to leave the stage which was then separated from the audience by a curtain of water.

To enter the Sun today, a visitor walks past a broken pay phone, then ascends a large red staircase flanked by what appear to be freshly painted white walls.

In a squalid tenement that reeks of garbage, up a dark staircase flanked by graffiti, the Muslims in the center of this teeming European capital find a place to pray.

Steerpike bowed and retired, and returned by an alternative staircase flanked by a long, steep curve of banister, down which he slid at high speed, landing nimbly at the foot of the stairs with a kind of pounce.