Worktop fabrication in Fulham

Yes. Fulham is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SW6. It is worked on our west London run, along with the rest of the borough. Visitor permits are issued to the household rather than to the trade, so the ones the day needs come from the customer and are best in hand the week before. Where unloading has to happen in one go, the load order is planned so nothing has to come off twice. Loaded for the carry, not for the van. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The bathroom upstairs sits directly over the kitchen, so its waste comes down in a boxed corner from floor to ceiling that no worktop is going to move. The galley run down a side-return usually measures longer than a slab will give us, so a join is designed in from the start and nested to land over a cabinet gable rather than wherever the material happens to run out. Nested to the route first and the slab second. 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. The template drawing carries the real geometry through to the saw, and the piece is machined to it rather than trimmed to it later. Machined to the real line.

Where the stairwell is narrow enough that the stone travels on edge the polished face runs within an inch of the plaster, so the walls get boarded as well as the steps. So the nesting is worked to the measured route first and to the slab second. An access join is dressed to the same standard as any other. A bay suspension carries a fee and a notice period, and the notice period is the part that catches people out when a date moves. Pieces are loaded in reverse fitting order so the first thing off the van is the first thing that goes down. The strapping answers to the walk, not the drive.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop installation. Where a family has been living around a building site for months, the finish date carries more weight than any other part of the specification. So the nesting is planned around it rather than around a standard kitchen. Small kitchens are more bench work per square metre. An open-plan extension puts the worktop in the middle of the living space, so it is looked at from the sofa as well as worked on. Pieces are dry-assembled and checked on the bench before anything is loaded. Cut for the slot, because the slot will not move.

A galley run down a side-return extension usually measures longer than a slab will give in one length, so a join is designed in from the start rather than discovered. The nest is laid out around that, with joins placed over cabinet gables and kept clear of every cut-out. Yield is worked on the slab, not on a calculator. Stone is £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and the templating, the fabrication and the fitting each carry their own line.

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. Cut it square where it should be radiused and the piece will fail on the lift, not in the kitchen. Cut oversize on purpose, every time. The sink and hob need to be on site and the run layout fixed before we start cutting, because moving a hob after the join position is set means recutting the whole piece. 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. The workshop works from the approved drawing, so whoever signs it off is signing off the join positions too. One approval, one cut, one delivery.

A join added to get stone into the room is a different thing from a join added because the slab ran out, and the quote says which is which. A piece travels on edge, never flat, because on edge is how stone of that length carries its own weight. A window sill or a radiator on the half-landing takes the corner out of the turn at precisely the point the piece needs that corner. Getting that wrong leaves a finished, machined piece that cannot reach the room, which is a remake rather than a trim. The longest piece is capped in the workshop, deliberately.

Damage found on the bench never leaves the workshop, and damage on the carry is remade under the same cover. Floors and units are protected before anything comes through the door. A piece is never laid flat across a gap while it is moved, because that is how stone cracks unaided. Carrying down a flight is not the easier direction, because the weight runs ahead of the crew and whoever is at the bottom has no way of stopping a slip. The maximum piece length is fixed at drawing stage and every join is placed over a cabinet gable from there. Nothing leaves the bench longer than the way in allows.

Cut-outs, edge profile and join count are itemised, so taking one out removes a line rather than starting an argument. The edge profile is its own line, so a shaped edge and a square one are two different figures. Every run, cut-out, edge, join and groove set is a line, which is what makes it comparable with anyone else’s. Floors settle, and once base units are packed and levelled properly the stone sits true while everything else in the room admits it is not. The workshop cuts to the plotted line rather than to a nominal dimension, which is why a scribe edge leaves the bench deliberately oversize. The relief comes out of the slab, not the fitter.

Slabs come in finite sizes, so a long run needs a join whatever the room looks like. A finished join is typically two to three millimetres, colour-matched and sanded flush. There are only ever a few legal positions, and the one taken is furthest from the light. Side-return kitchens are long and narrow with one outside wall, and the wall the run sits against is often the oldest, least straight surface in the house. A join that lands in the wrong place cannot be moved once the cut-outs are machined, so it is settled on the drawing. The return is nested first, because it fits worst.