Splashbacks and upstands in Bromley Common

Yes. Bromley Common is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are BR2. It is worked on our south east London run, along with the rest of Bromley. A drive behind an electric gate depends on somebody being in to open it and on the gate staying open while the load comes off. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. Distance from tail lift to door is the whole risk here. There is nothing to drive to and nothing to pick up, because both visits are to the property itself.

The back door frequently opens straight into the kitchen, which is the best carry route in the house and the one people forget to mention. That leaves a ragged band right where the upstand has to sit, which is fine for a 100mm upstand that covers it, but a full-height splashback needs the wall made good first or it will rock on the high spots. Old plaster rarely gives you a flat metre. A notch around a boxed stack is machined with a radius at the internal corner, because a square inside corner there is exactly where a top will crack. It is usually what pushes a job towards a 100mm upstand instead of a full-height panel, because an upstand rides what a panel exposes. A downstand sets the panel height, not the wall units.

Where the turn inside is tight the piece gets turned on the path and brought in already on edge, which needs room in front of the door as well as behind it. 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. The panel is sized to the turn, not to the wall alone. Some drives are wide enough for the van and too short for the tail lift, because the tail lift needs its own clear metre behind the vehicle. Splashbacks are normally the last thing off, so a short parking window is exactly when they get rushed. A long carry turns a light piece into an awkward one.

One of the three we are asked for most, although worktop replacement is asked for more. Same template visit, same workshop, same installers either way. 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. Splashbacks and upstands are cut from the same slab run at the same time, which is the only way the batch actually matches. Panels for every unit, cut in one go. Rear and side-return extensions are where the islands appear, and an island is the piece that decides whether one slab does the kitchen or two. Ordered later from a different batch, the match is not reliable exactly where the pieces meet. A spare panel is cheaper now than next year.

A dishwasher door on one side and an oven door on the other cannot both stand open in a narrow aisle, so which appliance goes where matters more in this shape than in any other. The same shape decides where splashback pieces break, and a joint in a corner reads as a detail while one in a clear run reads as a mistake. Panel height is set by the extractor. Material runs £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting each get their own line.

A live soil stack cannot be chased back into the wall, so the depth it steals is permanent and the run is planned around it rather than through it. Where the wall cannot be made good, setting the stone deliberately proud on a subframe with a shadow gap reads as a detail rather than a bad fit. Behind the boxing it becomes two pieces. The old tiling must be off and the wall made good and dry before templating, not on fitting day. Mixed ownership means the decision-maker is not always the person who lets us in, so it is worth being clear early about who signs the quote off. A 100mm upstand is the low-maintenance answer, and full-height stone is the one that has to be committed to early. A deferred splashback still comes off this drawing.

Sinks, taps and hobs are yours to buy in any case, and they only have to be in the room for the template. How the slab has been stored is worth telling us, because stone kept flat is not stone off a rack. A new extension slab is not automatically level, and that wants checking before templating rather than after the stone is cut. Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because a cut-out in the wrong place means a new piece. Reordered next year, it will not match.

Upstands and splashbacks are templated after the worktop is down and settled, so they are a separate visit. Nothing is measured until the sink, the tap and the hob are in the room to measure against. There is nothing to pay before the template visit. A shallow bay or a squared-off rear window means the run beneath it is rarely the same depth at both ends. What decides between a slim upstand and full-height stone is nearly always the wall rather than the taste. Sockets cut in the shop, not on site.

Upstand or splashback, the stone is cut from the same slab run as the worktop, at the same time, so the batch actually matches. The joint between splashback and worktop is siliconed, never grouted, so it can move a little without cracking. Original quarry-tiled floors sit lower than a later screed, so a run crossing that junction needs the units packed to one level. The ragged band left when old tiles and laminate come off together is what usually decides upstand over full height. The wall gets made good first or the gap shows.

The sink and hob are lifted out with the old top and kept aside if you are reusing them. Old tops are screwed or glued from underneath, so the drawer boxes come out before the worktop does. Tiling bonded to the wall behind usually comes away with the old top, so that wall is agreed beforehand. Where the drive falls away from the house the trolley wants to run, and where it climbs the same load has to be pushed the whole way up. Full-height panels are the awkward thing to move, light enough to lift and long enough to flex on the way. Panels come across in one pass with the route already cleared.