Kitchen worktops in Headstone

Yes. Solid interwar family stock around the recreation ground and manor, with kitchens usually enlarged by taking in the old larder and a small rear addition rather than a full extension. Typical result is a U-shape of about 3m, 2.4m and 1.5m with a peninsula at the dining end. Off-street parking means the van stays put all day, so tools, packers and the offcut we would rather have than not are all within reach. 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. Old tops out and new stone in, both through the same gap.

1930s semi, 1920s cottage-style house and 1960s purpose-built flat. The chimney breast in the corner has usually been left in place, so the run gains a return and two scribed ends. The kitchen is normally the original back room with a later side-return or rear extension bolted on, and that helps us: most pieces can go down the side alley and in through the back door in one length, so we can avoid joins that a front-door route would force. Units kept, surface changed, one day.

Wide verged residential roads with driveways, and a fair number of houses with a genuine side passage of 900mm or more that takes a slab on edge comfortably. 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. 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 strip-out is planned around it.

Worktop installation, worktop templating and worktop replacement, in that order. Extension kitchens are usually specified long before they are buildable, so the run lengths on the drawing and the run lengths in the room are different numbers. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. One visit, done properly. U-shaped kitchens need three templated pieces meeting at two internal corners, and those corners want mitred joints rather than butts if the veining is directional.

A U shape uses more linear metres than people expect, and the two returns rarely nest together, so a second slab is a genuine possibility. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. The units stay, the surface changes. Legs bottoming out on hard concrete or an uneven screed mean the tops of the carcasses are not one plane, and that is picked up at template rather than on fitting day. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. The laminate has been covering it up. Material runs from £110 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines rather than rolled into one figure.

Where someone is living in the house through the work, the strip-out and the fit are planned so the kitchen is out of use for a day and not a week. If the carcasses are tired the honest answer is that stone will find that out, and it is better said before than after. Sound carcasses are the condition. Tell us the building when you book and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice get built into the day rather than found on it.