Splashbacks and upstands in Colliers Wood

Yes. Colliers Wood is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SW19, CR4. It is worked on our south west London run, along with the rest of Merton. A dedicated loading bay or service yard is the easiest arrangement in a managed building, provided the slot is booked and someone has the key to the shutter. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. One trip is always better than three. Everything that involves you happens in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

Every flat on the floor is the same plan handed left and right, so the room is predictable even where the building is not. The plasterboard is genuinely flat here, so a full-height splashback sits well and a slim upstand looks almost redundant, but the sockets are the problem, because they are set out to the developer's original kitchen and often land at odd heights or right on a joint line. Blown plaster comes off before stone goes on. Where the boxing stands proud of the finished wall the upstand behind it has to be broken into separate lengths, because one piece cannot pass it. 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. Nothing gets hidden behind a full-height panel.

Piece length is set by the internal diagonal of the lift car, not by the length of the slab. 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. Upstands make almost any turn a worktop will not. Bay bookings are usually an hour or two, which is fine for unloading and no use at all as a place to leave the van for a day. Splashbacks are normally the last thing off, so a short parking window is exactly when they get rushed. That is why they are crated the way they are.

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. Developer-fitted kitchens come with thin cam-lock carcasses, which are fine under laminate and want bracing before stone goes on them. Splashbacks and upstands are cut from the same slab run at the same time, which is the only way the batch actually matches. The annexe gets the same panel as the main run. Housings and integrated appliances are set out for a 38mm laminate top, so dropping to 20mm or 30mm stone changes the clearances and needs checking before anything is cut. Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because a cut-out in the wrong place means a new piece. A repeated spec needs a repeatable splashback.

A tall bank of housings at one end takes a chunk out of the working run, so the usable length of that side is always less than the length of the wall behind it. 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. Long walls break where the worktop breaks. Material sits between £110 and £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted line by line.

A boxed soil stack or service riser in the corner of a run eats into the worktop depth and has to be scribed around rather than cut square. A tall panel that fits at the worktop will stand off the wall at the top unless the wall is dubbed out or the panel is scribed. The reveal decides where the stone dies. Any socket you intend to move must be moved and re-plastered before templating, because a cut-out in the wrong place means a new piece of stone. The householder is normally on site at template, and that is the right time to settle sink position, tap centres and overhang rather than agree them by email. A 100mm upstand is the low-maintenance answer, and full-height stone is the one that has to be committed to early. The wall trade answers to a different budget.

On the fitting day floors and door frames are protected, joins clamped flush, sink and hob sealed. If the units run late the template moves, not the fit: the gap between them is fabrication. No money is taken before the template happens. Underfloor heating in a screed rules out fixing into the floor and rules out standing anything heavy on a single point. What decides between a slim upstand and full-height stone is nearly always the wall rather than the taste. Full height needs a flat wall and a finished electrician.

The bowl position has to be settled before templating, since the grooves are set out from it. 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. The kitchen is usually part of the living space, so three edges are read from a sofa rather than from standing height at the sink. Splashbacks come off the same slab run as the tops, which means the decision has to be made before fabrication starts. An upstand asks less of old plaster than a panel does.

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. An old stone top is heavier coming out than the new one is going in, and leaves in sections. Underground loading has a height restriction, and a van with an A-frame on it is taller than the driver remembers. Full-height panels are the awkward thing to move, light enough to lift and long enough to flex on the way. Long panels and long carries do not mix.

Veining carries through a join where both pieces come off the same slab, which is decided at nesting. A join cannot cross a cut-out, so a sink mid-run takes away the position you would have used. An island often runs in one piece where a wall run cannot. A full-depth tall unit projects past the worktop line, and the run has to be scribed against its side panel instead of carrying on past it. Long runs almost never take a single panel, so the joint positions want agreeing before anything is templated. Upstands follow the return round the corner.