Reception counters and desks in Hainault

Yes. Hainault is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are IG6. It is worked on our east London run, along with the rest of Redbridge. A drive that shelves towards the house needs the van chocked and the trolley controlled, since a loaded A-frame gathers speed quickly on a slope. A commercial frontage rarely has anywhere to stop, so the unload is timed rather than assumed and the counter pieces come off first. Nothing is stood anywhere on a pavement it could be knocked from. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The wall between the kitchen and the hall is load-bearing blockwork rather than a stud, so an opening through it is a lintel job and not an afternoon with a bolster. These are the counters where the lower transaction shelf earns its keep, because the people served at it are the people the standard was written for, so the knee space and the clear approach to it are checked on site rather than taken off a drawing. A porter's desk stands on its own carcass, fixed into nothing original. A run can measure dead right at both ends and still belly out in the middle, which only appears once the template plots the intermediate points. A counter is worse off than a kitchen here, because it usually stands clear of the wall and has nothing behind it to hide a gap. Where the plaster bows, the counter is drawn away from it.

A side gate hung to open outward against a fence post is narrower in use than it measures, and lifting the gate off its hinges is usually the quickest win on the route. The lower transaction shelf is short and easily handled; it is the upper counter that has to be walked in on edge and turned at every corner. Pieces come in the order the carcass will accept them. Gravel and block paving both look like hard standing and neither takes a loaded trolley, so the run from tail lift to door gets boarded. Loading bays belonging to the building are booked by whoever holds the lease, and that is seldom whoever ordered the counter. A height barrier rules out the tail lift before it rules out anything else.

Not really, and there is no sense dressing it up. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop replacement, worktop installation and worktop templating. That is a statement about the local housing rather than about the work. It gets quoted, cut and fitted exactly as it would anywhere else on the patch. Where kitchens turn over between tenancies the priority is a surface that survives a decade of being treated as a chopping board. Where an operator is fitting out several receptions, the counters come off one slab run so the desks read as a set rather than as neighbours. Repeat receptions are worth settling once and then leaving alone. Landlord work is scheduled around void periods, so the whole thing is a fixed window and the template date matters as much as the fitting date. A fit-out programme puts the counter last, behind the joiner and the electrician, which is exactly when the least time is left to template it. On a fit-out counter the date is half the decision.

A breakfast bar on the outer side is an overhang like any other, and the support under it is sized for people leaning on the end rather than for the weight of the stone alone. The return between the high counter and the low shelf never nests neatly, and it is what decides how much slab the desk swallows. The return between the two levels is drawn first and cut first. Material sits between £110 and £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted line by line.

Where a corner is a couple of degrees off, a mitre cut to a theoretical ninety degrees opens on the wall side and there is no closing it afterwards. What a counter is scribed to is the joiner's carcass rather than the plaster, which is why it is templated after the carcass is fixed and never before. A shadow gap solves what a scribe cannot. Tell us the hours the building can be worked in and whether the lobby stays open, and send photographs of every corner so we can find the ducts before we draw. Consent for the work sits with the freeholder or the managing body, and getting it in writing first avoids a crew arriving to a locked door. The same split runs through commercial property: a landlord fitting out a shell and a tenant fitting out their own reception want different things from one counter. A desk approved in principle is not a desk approved to cut.

On a replacement the old top comes off in the morning and the new stone is down and sealed the same day. The sink and hob are lifted out with the old top and kept aside if you are reusing them. Disposal means it goes in the van, not into the garden to wait for a collection. 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. The upper counter is the longest piece on the van, so the tail lift needs the full swing radius clear on the pavement. Service yards want a name and a time, given a week out.

What moves the figure after templating is a change you make: a different edge, an extra cut-out, a bigger sink chosen late. No installed price per square metre is published, because it is not a real number. Taking the old tops away is a line rather than an assumption, so it comes off if you do not want it. The stone carries the scribe because the wall cannot be persuaded, so back edges are cut oversize and eased in rather than dropped straight down. Where the floor falls away across a lobby the carcass is packed level first, because the top cannot correct anything sitting under it. The knee recess is checked for square before the shelf is cut.

The fitting itself is one visit: a plain run is a morning, an island with splashbacks takes most of the day. Between the template and the fit the slab is nested, cut, mitred and dry-assembled on the bench, which is work you never see and is most of the wait. No payment is due before the template. Dense concrete and blockwork mean the wall cannot be chased back or packed out, so the stone carries the scribe. A reception counter answers to the building it stands in more than to the drawing, because it is fabricated to a carcass somebody else has already built and fixed. The height that matters most is the low one.

A tap under a window board still needs room for its handle to lift, which is checked at the template. We seat and seal the sink and hob on the day; water, waste, gas and electrics are for your plumber and electrician. The tap hole is drilled in the workshop too, and its position depends on how far the tap has to swing. A peninsula projects into circulation space, so its outer corners usually take a radius rather than a point, and that radius is agreed at template rather than assumed. An external corner on a counter is seen from both sides at once, so it is mitred rather than butted and the pattern is carried round it. A counter join lines up with the plane above it or it gets moved.