Worktop replacement 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. 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 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. Two loads, one space, one day. There is nothing to drive to and nothing to pick up, because both visits are to the property itself.

Piece size is set by the lift car and the entrance dogleg, which routinely turns a two-piece kitchen into a three-piece one. The work is all in the building, not the kitchen. A replacement is measured against the walls as they are now. 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. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. What is behind the old top decides the day.

A lift out of service for the day turns a straightforward install into a stair carry, so the slot gets confirmed with whoever manages the building rather than against a calendar. Worth remembering that the old tops have to come out the way the new ones come in, and a laminate run is easier to remove in one length than to carry in one. A laminate run comes out easier than stone goes in. 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. 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. The old tops have to go somewhere as well.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop splashbacks & upstands. A specification repeated across several plots has to be repeatable, which quietly rules out the natural stones where no two slabs match. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. A deposit deduction rarely covers a new top. Replacing one plot years after handover is the problem nobody plans for, because a quartz colour can be reordered and a granite block cannot. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. Four flats, four days, no scaffold week.

An aisle under a metre stops being a working space the moment two people are in it, and the depth of the tops either side is what decides whether that happens. The existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. Joins move onto the gables this time round. Material runs £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting each get their own line.

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. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. The beading was covering a bowed wall. Book the service lift, loading bay and concierge access for the full day, and confirm the building's permitted working hours in writing. A quartz sample left on the counter for a week under the actual kitchen lights settles more arguments than any showroom, and an owner is the only person in a position to do that. A replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. One day out of use, agreed in advance.

Granite tells you when the seal wants topping up: water stops beading on the surface and starts darkening it instead. The bead where the sink and hob meet the stone is siliconed rather than sealed, and wants watching. No maintenance visit is built into the job. Soap, water, and on the porous stones a seal. Dot-and-dab plasterboard bellies at a taped internal angle, so the run picks up a few millimetres over the last 300mm and a plan-angle mitre will not close. Housings set out for a 38mm laminate change clearance when you drop to 20mm or 30mm stone, and that is checked before cutting. Chipboard that has taken water will not take stone.

Upstands and splashbacks are templated after the worktop is down and settled, so they are a separate visit. On the fitting day floors and door frames are protected, joins clamped flush, sink and hob sealed. The template is taken in your kitchen after the units are in and fixed, never before. Plasterboard partitions mean light scribes and clean joins, and the fabrication effort moves to the visible faces instead. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the job is a day, and what makes it a difficult day is the building. Chipboard carcasses get bracing before stone lands on them.

A long top on units that were shimmed once and never checked is the commonest version of this, and it is cheap to fix beforehand. If the carcasses are corrected, the template is taken again, since a drawing off units that then moved is worthless. Levelling belongs in the carcasses, on their own legs and packers. Anything that has to stay accessible, a stopcock, a gas meter, a riser panel, is marked on the template so the stone is cut around it instead of over it. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. Strip out first, then measure what is actually there.

Every run, cut-out, edge, join and groove set is a line, which is what makes it comparable with anyone else’s. The quote is written from the template drawing. Before that it works from what you have described. Two kitchens the same length can be far apart, because material, edge and cut-outs move independently of size. A notch around a boxed stack is machined with a radius at the internal corner, because a square inside corner there is exactly where a top will crack. It usually explains the odd filler piece or strip of beading in the existing run that nobody could account for. The old carcasses are rarely level and never were.