Worktop replacement in Clapham

Yes. Clapham is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SW4. It is worked on our south London run, along with the rest of Lambeth. Loading concessions differ from one zone to the next rather than following a single national rule, so what applied on the last job proves nothing about this one. A replacement is a two-way job, with old tops going out and new stone coming in, so the van needs to stay put across the whole day. Both loads want the same few metres of kerb. The measuring and the fitting are both done at the property, so there is nothing to visit or collect.

The party wall is the straightest surface in the house and everything else has moved away from it over a century. In most Victorian terraces the kitchen sits in the back addition, so you get a narrow galley with one outside wall and nothing square to work off. The wall behind the old top has not been seen in years. Once the carcasses are levelled the gap under the plinth varies along the run, and that varying gap is the honest record of what the floor is doing. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. The old cut-out was hiding the notch you now need.

Counting hands matters more than counting metres on a staircase, because a piece two people lift off a van still wants three on the flight and a fourth watching the trailing corner. With no room to turn, the old top gets cut up in the kitchen instead, which is dusty work and needs the room emptied first. Disconnection happens before the old top is lifted, not during. A van waiting on a loading concession has somebody standing with it, because a vehicle left unattended is the one that collects the ticket. Waste is the part people forget: the old laminate or tired granite has to be walked back to the van and it does not get lighter. Half a day of parking buys half a job.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop installation. A kitchen carved out of a larger room sits under whatever the original plan left behind, so the run frequently ends at a blocked doorway or a boxed-in service. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. A builder-finish kitchen upgrades in a morning. Conversions put kitchens where the services could be made to reach rather than where they belong, so runs are short and interrupted. Old tops out in the morning, new stone down and sealed the same afternoon. The doors are staying, so the colour answers to them.

Where the aisle is too tight the usual answer is a reduced-depth top on one side, and a 500mm run is a different cut, a different sink and a different drainer to a 600mm one. The existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. The sink is chosen before the cut list is set. Supply-only material is £110 to £550 per square metre, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted separately rather than rolled in.

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. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. Levels get corrected before the new top is measured. Have a plumber booked to disconnect the sink, tap and waste first thing and reconnect after we have gone, and clear the hallway and stairs completely so we can carry slabs through the house. 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 replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. Somebody has to own the skip.

Taking the old tops away is a line rather than an assumption, so it comes off if you do not want it. The quote is written from the template drawing. Before that it works from what you have described. Cut-outs, edge profile and join count are itemised, so taking one out removes a line rather than starting an argument. Where two pieces meet over a fall in the floor the join has to be flush to the hand as well as true to the level, because the eye reads the join and forgives the room. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. Same footprint, different tolerances.

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. On a replacement the old top comes off in the morning and the new stone is down and sealed the same day. Controlled hours that end in the middle of the afternoon make the second half of the day easy and put the whole problem in the first half. We stage the strip-out so the old tops leave in one trip rather than trickling out across the afternoon. The carry happens twice here, so the distance counts twice.

Grooves are machined in the workshop at the same time as the bowl cut-out, because they cannot be done well in a kitchen. Which side of the bowl they go is about how you stand at the sink, and it is settled before cutting. The original front door is narrow and the hall is often the only way in, which puts a ceiling on the longest single piece. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the job is a day, and what makes it a difficult day is the building. Stone is far heavier than what is coming off.

Where the hob lands is set out against the units and the wall behind, not off the kitchen plan. Nothing is cut out in the kitchen. Cutting a bowl on site is how worktops get cracked. The tap hole is drilled in the workshop too, and its position depends on how far the tap has to swing. Two parallel runs with a walkway between them is the most efficient shape there is on a slab, because both pieces nest as straight lengths with almost no waste. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. Joins move onto the gables this time round.