Kitchen worktops in Between the Commons

Yes. This is the densest concentration of side-return and full-width rear extensions in the borough, the alley is infilled, the rear wall is pushed back, and the result is a 4m to 5m wide kitchen with a long run plus a 2.4m to 3m island under a flat rooflight. Islands almost always carry a hob and a mitred end panel. Where a marked loading box sits on the red route the stop is legal but timed, so the unload runs as one movement with every hand on it. The fitting slot is set around it, which is why we ask about it when the date is booked and not before we leave the yard. Van to door is the distance that matters.

Late Victorian terrace and Edwardian terrace. The step down from the main house into the addition is commonly a hundred to a hundred and fifty millimetres, which gives the kitchen a different floor datum from the rest of the ground floor. We measure the front door, the hall width and the turn into the kitchen before anything comes off the van, because a 3m piece has to swing through that corner on edge and stone does not bend to help you. The age of the house sets the pace of it.

Uniform terraces with small front gardens, permit-only parking that is full by 9am, and no vehicle access to the rear at all. Everything goes down the hallway past the stairs, and the hall width of roughly 950mm sets the maximum slab width that can be turned. Door width, hall width and the diagonal at the turn are three separate measurements, and it is the diagonal that catches people out. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. Every piece is staged to it before fitting starts.

Worktop installation, in that order. An open-plan extension puts the worktop in the middle of the living space, so it is looked at from the sofa as well as worked on. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Sealed before we leave. The island is the whole job here, get the exact spine position and the overhang for stools agreed on site before templating, because clients change their mind about seating after the units land.

Sockets set into the end panel keep the top clear, but they sit below the stone and are cut into the panel by the fitter rather than machined into the worktop. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. The island is set against the perimeter, not a wall. A window board sitting below finished worktop height leaves two choices, drop the top under it or notch the stone around it, and both cost more than a straight run. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. The gap closes on the grinder, not in the sealant gun. Material runs from £110 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines rather than rolled into one figure.

Whoever manages the block controls the lift booking, the bin store and the visitor parking, and none of that sits in the gift of the household whose kitchen it is. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. Owner or agent, somebody has to be reachable. Tell us the building when you book and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice get built into the day rather than found on it.

Grooves and an undermounted bowl are usually specified together, since the grooves are run to the bowl edge. The alternative stands on the surface, so the choice is losing worktop permanently or only while you are draining. Sash windows sit low in the rear wall, and the sill often lands below the height a worktop wants to run past. The fitting day is planned backwards from all of it, before the first piece comes off the van. Access, floor and wall in that order, then stone.

Every run, cut-out, edge, join and groove set is a line, which is what makes it comparable with anyone else’s. What is quoted is what the drawing says, and the figure does not move unless the drawing does. No installed price per square metre is published, because it is not a real number. A cill projecting forward of the plaster line pushes the back edge out, and the units then stand off the wall by that amount for the whole length. Rushing that is what leaves a gap you look at every morning for fifteen years. Level is checked across the room, not along one wall.

Sinks, taps and hobs are yours to buy in any case, and they only have to be in the room for the template. If your own slab breaks there is no matching replacement to hand, and that is the real difference. Stone cut to somebody else’s drawing cannot usefully be re-cut to yours. Extension budgets are usually well spent by the time the worktop is ordered, which is where the choice between quartz and a thinner sintered stone actually gets made. Where the window is fixed there is no second day to fall back on, so the prep list matters more than usual. Consecutive days, one kitchen at a time.

The tap hole is drilled in the workshop too, and its position depends on how far the tap has to swing. A boiling tap needs a hole of its own and a cupboard below for the tank, so the units change too. Nothing is cut out in the kitchen. Cutting a bowl on site is how worktops get cracked. A pop-up socket in the surface is one more cut-out through the full thickness, and it wants the same clear space beneath it that a sink does. A layout that has been packed and levelled run by run instead of to one datum shows as a step where two pieces meet. Steel under the overhang before stone goes near it.