Kitchen worktops in Camberwell

Yes. The Georgian houses on the hill are mostly flats, with kitchens tucked into a rear closet wing or a lower ground room; the Victorian terraces further out are the classic side-return job where the kitchen becomes a 5m by 4m rear room with an island of about 1.8m and a run of 3m to 3.6m. Without a bay the van ends up on a single yellow with a crew member watching it, which takes a pair of hands off the carry. 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. An early slot is the cheapest parking arrangement there is.

Georgian terrace, Victorian villa, Victorian terrace and 1950s and 1960s council estate. The boiler has usually been moved out of the main house into the addition, and its flue, its pipework and its condensate all cross the wall the run wants. The day is planned backwards from the hall. The slow parts are slow for a reason.

Conservation-area streets with railed front gardens and steps up to the door, plus permit parking and a busy one-way system around the green - most slabs go in through the front hall past a stair newel. Communal stairs get boarded and the handrail padded, and we walk the route with a tape before the first piece leaves the van. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. The hall is cleared before the first piece comes off the trolley.

Worktop installation, in that order. 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. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Consecutive days, one kitchen at a time. Side-return extensions here often have bifolds set into a steel that has deflected slightly, so check the level along the whole rear run before templating.

Everything on an island is fed from underneath, extraction, a socket run, a hob and sometimes a waste, and each of them wants its hole before the top is bonded down. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. Steel under the overhang before stone goes near it. A wall line that runs level over a floor that does not means the finish closes up on the plinth at one end, which is joinery rather than something the stone can answer. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. Level is checked across the room, not along one wall. Material is quoted supply only from £110 per square metre, and templating, fabrication and fitting are given their own lines rather than one combined figure.

Where a landlord or housing provider is involved there is a specification to meet and a process to follow, and both are settled before a date is offered. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. One person is responsible for the door that morning. Tell us what the building is when you book, and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice are planned in rather than discovered.

An island often runs in one piece where a wall run cannot. Dark and heavily veined stone shows a join more than a pale even one, which is worth knowing before the slab is picked. A join cannot cross a cut-out, so a sink mid-run takes away the position you would have used. Island units are rarely fixed to anything at first fix, so they get screwed to the floor and levelled against the perimeter run before the stone is measured at all. Joins are pulled with suction clamps and finished flush, then colour-matched, which is the last thing done rather than the first. A corner that will not close is never forced.

Sealing is the one maintenance job that genuinely differs by material, and it is worth knowing which you are buying before the slab is chosen. Quartz carries resin, so a hot pan wants a trivet, while granite and sintered stone will take one without complaint. Where a top takes wine, oil and lemon most days, the non-porous materials ask least of the household. The stairs come down against the wall the addition opens off, so the doorway into the kitchen is offset and the corner beside it is taken by the cupboard under the flight. 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 house sets the order of work.

Machining is permanent. If a later kitchen moves the sink, the grooves stay where they were cut. They read strongly across a dark stone and are nearly invisible on a pale one, so look before deciding. Where there is no room for a separate drainer, grooves are usually what gets specified instead. A picture rail, a deep skirting and a moulded architrave all sit in the way of anything that assumes flat wall from floor to ceiling. The fitting day is planned backwards from all of it, before the first piece comes off the van. The first hour is protection and packing, not stone.

The lift, if there is one, is measured on the diagonal, because that is the dimension a long piece actually uses. A join added to get stone into the room is a different thing from a join added because the slab ran out, and the quote says which is which. Weight tells on a staircase more than anywhere else, because there is nowhere to set a piece down mid-flight and no way to change your grip once it is moving. Finding it out on the morning costs the whole slot, because there is no second route to fall back on. Boards go down wherever a loaded trolley has to run.