Worktop installation in Eden Park

Yes. Eden Park is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are BR3. It is worked on our south east London run, along with the rest of Bromley. Where the drive is shared, the half-hour the van spends in the way is agreed with the neighbour in advance rather than apologised for at the time. A van that has to move mid-fit costs the best part of an hour and takes a man off the tools to do it. Forty metres of carry changes the shape of the whole day. Everything that involves you happens in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The rear wall now carries french or folding doors across most of its width, so a whole side of the room opens and a long piece comes straight in off the garden. Access is usually the easy part here, as most of these have a side gate and a back door straight into the kitchen, so we carry down the side alley rather than through the house and keep the mess outside. The age of the house sets the pace of it. Where a run finishes into a reveal, the depth of that reveal is taken at worktop height and nowhere else. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. Mark it, lift it, cut it, offer it up again.

The side passage is the measurement that matters, because a piece has to be carried flat down it and then turned in at the back door, and the turn is always tighter than the passage. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. A carry that needs six hands gets six hands. A step up from the drive to the threshold turns the last two metres into a lift, and a lift is where two pairs of hands become the minimum. We aim for the first slot of the day where parking is tight, because that is when the street is emptiest. We would rather start at seven than argue with a warden.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop replacement. Extension budgets are usually well spent by the time the worktop is ordered, which is where the choice between quartz and a thinner sintered stone actually gets made. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Fire doors stay shut, so the carry route is longer. 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. One visit, with the sink and hob seated and sealed before we leave. The last trade in inherits every delay before it.

Where the return runs into a wall that is out of square, the corner is templated as the angle it really is rather than as ninety degrees. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. One datum for every run in the room. Material sits between £110 and £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted line by line.

Sill height gets settled with the template on site, because it is one of the few dimensions nobody has measured before we arrive. Rushing that is what leaves a gap you look at every morning for fifteen years. The gap closes on the grinder, not in the sealant gun. Unlock and clear the side gate and back door, and move bins, planters and washing lines out of the alley run. Where two people share the decision it helps to know early which of them is settling the edge profile and which is settling the budget, because it is rarely the same person for both. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. Scheme rules on working hours are checked first.

On a porous stone the grooved area is sealed with the rest, and it gets wet more than anything else. Grooves are machined in the workshop at the same time as the bowl cut-out, because they cannot be done well in a kitchen. A side passage and a back door mean the stone rarely has to come through the house, which changes the job more than most people expect. The fitting day is planned backwards from all of it, before the first piece comes off the van. The whole run is dry-fitted before any adhesive is opened.

Taking the old tops away is a line rather than an assumption, so it comes off if you do not want it. Nothing is payable until the template, and the template measures the room as it stands rather than estimating from a plan. A window board sitting below finished worktop height leaves two choices, drop the top under it or notch the stone around it, and both cost more than a straight run. The back edge is eased in progressively rather than offered up once and forced. Level is checked across the room, not along one wall.

Old laminate is light and awkward rather than heavy, so it is usually the easier half of the day. An old stone top is heavier coming out than the new one is going in, and leaves in sections. On a replacement the old top comes off in the morning and the new stone is down and sealed the same day. Where the van cannot turn on the plot it has to arrive already facing the right way, so the approach along the street is part of the plan. Two men and a long carry is a different day from two men and a drive, and the crew is sized on that. A booked bay only helps if it is empty when we arrive.

Splitting a run costs a join, and that is the price of getting stone into the room at all. The lift, if there is one, is measured on the diagonal, because that is the dimension a long piece actually uses. Rear access usually lets us fit longer pieces whole, so the join count ends up decided by the slab rather than by the building. Finding it out on the morning costs the whole slot, because there is no second route to fall back on. Nobody sets a worktop down mid-flight to change grip.