Worktop installation in Chelsea

Yes. Chelsea is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SW3. It is worked on our west London run, along with the rest of the borough. The goods lift has its own booking sheet, and a bay slot without a lift slot only gets the stone as far as the lobby. A van that has to move mid-fit costs the best part of an hour and takes a man off the tools to do it. A drive and a red route make two different fitting days. Nothing needs visiting and nothing needs collecting: the template is in your kitchen and so is the fit.

Rooms are tall with deep window reveals, and a run finishing into a reveal is templated to it rather than assumed square. The day is planned backwards from the hall. A dry-lined wall hides a void, and the void gets bridged. Legs bottoming out on hard concrete or an uneven screed mean the tops of the carcasses are not one plane, and that is picked up at template rather than on fitting day. Rushing that is what leaves a gap you look at every morning for fifteen years. The overhang is checked again once the feet are set.

Sign-in at the gate, a permit on the dash and a named contact are usually wanted before anything comes off the van. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. Every piece is staged to it before fitting starts. A bay shared across a parade of shops turns over all day, so the arrival time matters more than the length of the booking does. We aim for the first slot of the day where parking is tight, because that is when the street is emptiest. The first hand off the van is the one holding the clock.

It is one of the three that come up most, though worktop replacement comes up more. Nothing changes between them: same template, same workshop, same installers. A new extension slab is not automatically level, and that wants checking before templating rather than after the stone is cut. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. The void ends whether we have finished or not. The junction between the original room and the extension is the point to watch, because the two floors rarely sit at the same height. One visit, with the sink and hob seated and sealed before we leave. Tenants are still in the building, so the stairs stay clear.

An island carries its own edge detail all the way round, so a mitred 100mm apron on four sides is four mitres cut, bonded and polished before the piece ever leaves the bench. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. Overhangs are measured off the finished carcass. Stone is £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and the templating, the fabrication and the fitting each carry their own line.

Level has to hold across the whole room rather than along one wall, or a floor that falls end to end shows as a step where two pieces meet. The back edge is eased in progressively rather than offered up once and forced. A scribe is a cut. It is not an adjustment. Clear the full hall and stairs route of furniture, bikes, coats and stair-gates, and keep the front door propped and unobstructed for the carry. Where ownership is split across a building, the common parts belong to someone else and the carry route is negotiated rather than assumed. A half-day of access is not a fitting day, and it is better to say so at booking than to find out at eleven. Booked around the tenant, not around the owner.

Old laminate is light and awkward rather than heavy, so it is usually the easier half of the day. What comes out goes by the same route the new stone comes in by, which is why that route is walked before anything is lifted. The units are untouched. Only the top of them changes. Building management is often the real gate rather than the bay itself, since the barrier, the shutter and the lift each need someone with a fob. Two men and a long carry is a different day from two men and a drive, and the crew is sized on that. It is why the arrival time is what it is.

The joint between splashback and worktop is siliconed, never grouted, so it can move a little without cracking. Upstand or splashback, the stone is cut from the same slab run as the worktop, at the same time, so the batch actually matches. Listing and conservation conditions apply to a good number of these, which constrains what can be altered around the kitchen rather than what goes on top of the units. Scribing takes longer than the carry does, so the quiet half of the day is the half that runs over. Movement joints in the shell stay movement joints.

An island often runs in one piece where a wall run cannot. What you get is a line rather than a step, because the pieces are levelled to each other first. Join count is a question about slab size and run length, nothing else. Waterfall ends are cut in sequence off the length either side of the top so the vein carries down the leg, and that sequence is gone the moment a piece has to be recut. A layout that has been packed and levelled run by run instead of to one datum shows as a step where two pieces meet. Packing goes under the units, not under the stone.

Say what you have and where it came from before anything is booked, because thickness and batch decide what can be done with it. Remnants bought elsewhere are the awkward case, because the drawing is then made to fit the stone. If your own slab breaks there is no matching replacement to hand, and that is the real difference. Extension kitchens are usually specified long before they are buildable, so the run lengths on the drawing and the run lengths in the room are different numbers. Fitting is booked as a run of consecutive days rather than as separate visits, which is what makes several kitchens in one building workable. A shared house stays occupied while we work in it.