After I took a number of photos of the hanging plant columns of the Basel Museum of Culture (during our visit at Thanksgiving), I turned my attention to the courtyard around them — the Schürhof — the floor of which is largely a set of low, wide steps descending to the museum lobby and gift shop.
The street entrance to the courtyard and thus to the museum is through a simple archway on the Münsterplatz.
Before the museum was renovated in 2011 by Herzog & de Meuron, the Schürhof* was not open to the public. The museum shared a door with the Museum of Natural Sciences around the corner.
Looking at a “before” photo (here, fourth image), the old courtyard appears to have been used at least partly as a parking lot.
The renovation excavated it to open up a new museum entrance in the base of the existing 1917 neoclassical building.
The other buildings that enclose the Schürhof are medieval.
Above and below are three views from upper windows inside the museum.
You can see a plan of the courtyard here (fifth image).
Above and below: looking back across the steps, standing at the lowest point.
Note the white symbol of access in the brick pavement.
It is necessary because the different shades of the bricks make a speckled pattern that somewhat obscures the individual steps when viewed from above and makes it difficult to see the ramp for wheelchairs.
Above: the ramp.
*I have not been able to find the source of this name.
enclos*ure 
This is a fabulous posting,
Sent from my iPad
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Thanks! I thought these steps were ingenious, if a little tricky for following wheelchair access.
attractive to look at, but a bit nerve-wracking if slippy in winter?
It didn’t seem slippery on that day, when it was very slightly damp. But on a rainy or frosty day, probably so. The rise/run ratio on the wide steps was very comfortable though.