Worktop replacement in Coombe (Kingston)

Yes. Coombe (Kingston) is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are KT2. It is worked on our south west London run, along with the rest of Kingston upon Thames. A shared drive is only useful if the neighbour is not the one parked behind the van, so we ask which side the standing belongs to before the date is set. 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. The carry happens twice here, so the distance counts twice. Template and fit both happen at the property, so there is nothing to drive to and nothing to collect.

A bay-fronted terrace has a long hall running past the stairs to the kitchen, so the hall turn caps the piece length before the run length does. Lath-and-plaster and bowed brickwork mean we template for scribes rather than straight cuts, and each piece is offered up and eased in rather than dropped straight down. Same units, straighter line, better surface. Plaster thickness varies over the height of a wall, so the line at worktop height is not the line at skirting level, and the units decide which one matters. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. What passed for a fit in chipboard will not pass in stone.

A height barrier on the car park entrance rules out a tail-lift van outright, and the stone then transfers to a trolley at the barrier itself. 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. The room is cleared for the way out as much as the way in. Drives with a dropped kerb and a tight turn-in take a long van at an angle, and that angle decides which side the tail lift can work from. 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. Booking the bay for the whole day is the honest plan.

Honestly, no, though it would be easy to claim otherwise. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop fabrication and worktop installation. That says something about the housing round here, not about the work. Quote, cut and fit are the same here as on any other part of the patch. An annexe kitchen is often built to keep a parent independent, so worktop height and reach matter as much as the material does. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. Between tenancies is the only window there is. A family adding a self-contained unit is paying for the whole conversion, and the worktop is one line in a much longer job. Old tops out in the morning, new stone down and sealed the same afternoon. One plot replaced years on, matched or otherwise.

Power and waste come up through the floor, and where they surface decides which cabinet can hold a sink and which one cannot. The existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. The strip-out is the part worth planning. Reckon on £110 to £550 per square metre for the material supply only, with templating, fabrication and fitting itemised separately.

Two walls each a degree out give an internal corner two degrees out, and the whole of that error lands in the mitre. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. Taking the top off is what exposes the floor. 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. Flats bought out of managed stock keep the original kitchen dimensions long after the ownership changed, so the layout says very little about who is paying for the work. 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.

Variation past what packing can take up has to be corrected in the carcasses before we cut, because the template records the units as they stand. Small variation is taken up by packing under the top on the fitting day. Levelling belongs in the carcasses, on their own legs and packers. A scribe has a working limit, and past twenty millimetres or so the back edge starts eating depth the run cannot spare. A laminate top was scribed thin at the back to swallow it, and stone cannot be shaved down the same way. The old cut-out was hiding the notch you now need.

Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because the openings are machined rather than chopped out on the wall. Stone up a wall is heavier than tile and bonded rather than hung, so the wall has to be sound. An upstand covers the gap where the worktop meets a wall that is not flat, which is its real job. The rear wall is usually a single brick thick and has been rendered, patched and re-rendered, so it bows in and out along the length of the run. What the old top has been hiding is usually a floor that settled towards the back and units that were never fixed back to the wall. The wall behind the old top has not been seen in years.

Chips at an edge or a corner are the usual form, because that is where stone is least supported. A dropped pan years later is a different question, and stone is remade rather than filled either way. Every piece is dry-assembled on the bench before it is loaded, so a fabrication mistake is found in the workshop rather than in your kitchen. Concierge buildings want the goods entrance, a booked lift and proof of insurance, all of which is straightforward when it is asked for a week out. 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. Old material is stacked outside rather than left along the route.

Stone cut to somebody else’s drawing cannot usefully be re-cut to yours. Sinks, taps and hobs are yours to buy in any case, and they only have to be in the room for the template. Where several adults share the cooking the kitchen is in use most of the day, so a fitting slot has to be agreed with more people than usual. A surface swap is the fastest upgrade available on a kitchen that is otherwise sound. Shared-house tops take a decade of hard use.