Kitchen worktops in Bromley-by-Bow

Yes. The dominant type is a post-war maisonette kitchen of 2m to 2.6m along one wall with a service duct in the corner and a window over the sink. New regeneration flats have small open-plan kitchens with a peninsula, usually already fitted with a laminate top that owners swap out. A resident bay and a shared-use bay can sit on the same street under different rules, and it is usually the shared one a visitor permit or a ticket touches. 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. Where the van stands sets how the day runs.

1960s-70s slab block, post-war low-rise maisonette and 2010s regeneration apartment. A maisonette puts the kitchen on one of two levels, so an internal staircase may be part of the route as well as the communal one. That suits a full-height piece, because a large flat panel bonded across its back is more stable on concrete than a run of small tiles ever was. A chimney breast breaks the run and the panels follow it.

The area is cut in two by a dual carriageway with red route restrictions on the approach, so unloading has to happen inside the estate roads rather than the main road. Estate parking is permit-controlled and the older blocks have a single small passenger lift, often around 1.1m deep, which caps piece length. Where the lift will not take the longest run we design a join in rather than gamble, because a piece that will not go up has to go back on the van. Splashback panels are lighter than a worktop and far more awkward, because a tall thin piece has to be carried on edge and cannot be tilted to clear a turn. Panels are carried on edge from the tail lift to the wall.

Worktop replacement, worktop installation and worktop splashbacks & upstands, in that order. A specification repeated across several plots has to be repeatable, which quietly rules out the natural stones where no two slabs match. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. A shared house stays occupied while we work in it. Lift depth decides the job here, so measure the car before quoting a single-piece top for anything above the second floor.

A galley puts the sink on one side and the hob on the other, which spreads the cut-outs across two pieces instead of weakening one. The existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. Where the seam went before is not where it goes now. A stack boxed diagonally across a corner leaves a triangle of dead space, and the top is cut to that triangle rather than to a square return. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. What is behind the old top decides the day. 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.

An owner living in the house makes the decisions and lives with them, so the specification tends to go towards the material rather than towards the lowest total. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. Communal floors are protected the same as private ones. 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.

Stone does not flex, so a run that rocks on its carcasses rocks just as badly once it is stone. If the carcasses are corrected, the template is taken again, since a drawing off units that then moved is worthless. Levelling belongs in the carcasses, on their own legs and packers. Where the boxing stands proud of the finished wall the upstand behind it has to be broken into separate lengths, because one piece cannot pass it. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. The beading was covering a bowed wall.

The tap hole is drilled in the workshop too, and its position depends on how far the tap has to swing. We seat and seal the sink and hob on the day; water, waste, gas and electrics are for your plumber and electrician. The catch with a galley is that both runs are seen end-on from the doorway, so any difference in overhang between the two reads immediately. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. Stone wants gables where laminate needed none.

Upkeep is settled when the slab is chosen, since it belongs to the material rather than the fabrication. No maintenance visit is built into the job. Soap, water, and on the porous stones a seal. Topping a seal up is a wipe-on job with a cloth. The internal stair is usually a straight flight with a tight top landing, and it is the landing rather than the flight that is the limit. Dense concrete takes adhesive better than fixings, which actually suits a large bonded panel. Where the plaster undulates, the shorter piece wins.

Grooves and an undermounted bowl are usually specified together, since the grooves are run to the bowl edge. Grooves are machined into the surface rather than applied to it, so there is nothing to come loose later. They read strongly across a dark stone and are nearly invisible on a pale one, so look before deciding. Where the kitchen has been opened into the living room the opening was trimmed with a steel, and a stub of the old wall was left standing at one end. Almost everything that makes a fitting day hard is a property of the building rather than of the stone. A bad floor is corrected under the carcass, never with sealant.