Kitchen worktops in Church Street

Yes. Flats over the market shops and in the surrounding blocks, with kitchens typically 2.2m to 2.6m of run and appliances chosen to fit rather than chosen first. New regeneration blocks nearby have open-plan kitchens with a compact peninsula and integrated appliances. Streets near a ground or a venue have restrictions that come and go with the fixture list rather than with the time of day. The templating visit needs somewhere to stop for two or three hours, which is a different problem from unloading for twenty minutes. The templater needs a proper stop, not a pause.

post-war estate block, flat above market shop, Victorian terrace and regeneration new-build. Low-rise blocks are three or four storeys with a single stair and no lift, so pieces go up on edge and the half-landing sets the maximum length. Carcass heights are read individually, since legs bottoming out on concrete mean the units do not share one plane. No stone is ever cut from a plan.

The street market runs most of the week and the stalls occupy the carriageway, so vehicle access is effectively before the market sets up or after it clears. Above-shop flats are reached by a street door between stalls and a steep stair. A walk-up with winders at every half-landing means the piece is rested and re-gripped on the way, so the crew size goes up before the piece size comes down. The templater measures that route on the same visit, so the drawing leaves site already knowing the maximum piece. The laser records it along with everything else.

Worktop replacement, worktop installation and worktop templating, in that order. 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. Old tops out in the morning, new stone down and sealed the same afternoon. Sound carcasses or it does not go ahead. Market days dictate the schedule here more than anything in the flat does - book the fit for a non-market morning or you will be carrying slabs through stalls.

Galley runs are usually short enough to come out of a single slab, so the material band you choose does more to the total than the room shape does. Join positions and vein direction are marked on the template drawing before it leaves site. The drawing leaves site complete. Boxing is rarely the same depth at worktop height as it is at floor level, so measuring it low down is the usual reason a top will not sit back. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. Found at template, not on fit 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.

Where ownership is split across a building, the common parts belong to someone else and the carry route is negotiated rather than assumed. If the carcasses are tired the honest answer is that stone will find that out, and it is better said before than after. Plumber either side of us. 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.