Kitchen worktops in Highams Park

Yes. Classic 1930s semis with a rear kitchen and separate dining room, usually opened up to make a 3.5m to 4m kitchen-diner with a peninsula or a modest island. Bay windows at the front and a garden door at the back mean the working run sits on the flank wall. On a drive that only takes one vehicle nose-in, the van has to reverse the whole length of it to get back out, which decides which way it goes in. The fitting slot is set around it, which is why we ask about it when the date is booked and not before we leave the yard. A drive and a red route make two different fitting days.

1930s semi-detached, interwar terrace and small recent development. The drains run down the side alley to a gully and an inspection cover near the back door, and the sink waste has always gone out on that side of the house. 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. Old fabric gets handled as old fabric.

The level crossing in the centre divides the area and holds up traffic at peak times, so timing the arrival matters and the alternative route is a long way round. Houses have driveways and side gates, so once you are there the carry is short and level. 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. None of it is worked out on the doorstep.

Worktop installation, in that order. 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. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. A shared house stays occupied while we work in it. The crossing is the only real obstacle here; after that these are straightforward, square, well-built rooms that template cleanly.

On a heavily veined stone the island and the run behind it are nested off the same area of slab so the movement relates across the room. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. Overhangs are measured off the finished carcass. Old breasts carry a bulge low down where the original opening was closed up, and the units stand off it before the stone is measured at all. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. Sealant seals. It does not fit. The stone itself starts at £110 per square metre supply only, with templating, fabrication and fitting quoted on their own lines instead of rolled together.

Because the money comes out of a household rather than a maintenance budget, phasing is common: tops now, island or splashbacks later, quoted so the second visit still matches the first. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. Keys confirmed the week before, not the morning of. Tell us about the building at the point of booking, so the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice are allowed for in advance.

Old laminate is light and awkward rather than heavy, so it is usually the easier half of the day. Tiling bonded to the wall behind usually comes away with the old top, so that wall is agreed beforehand. Take the old tops off yourself if you would rather, and the quote simply carries one line fewer. The distance from the standing to the actual kitchen door is the number that counts, since plenty of drives finish at a side gate and a garden path. 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. The first hand off the van is the one holding the clock.

An island often runs in one piece where a wall run cannot. Join count is a question about slab size and run length, nothing else. A join cannot cross a cut-out, so a sink mid-run takes away the position you would have used. Seating overhangs past roughly 300mm will not carry on the carcass alone, so flat steel bar or a plywood substrate has to be built into the units first. A layout that has been packed and levelled run by run instead of to one datum shows as a step where two pieces meet. Packing goes under the units, not under the stone.

Templating and fitting are two visits, not one, and the gap between them is when the stone is actually cut. The design and quotation visit comes first. It is free and carries no obligation. Nothing is measured until the sink, the tap and the hob are in the room to measure against. Rear extensions on these sit on shallow foundations, and the crack at the junction with the original wall tells you which way it has moved. The fitting day is planned backwards from all of it, before the first piece comes off the van. A bad floor is corrected under the carcass, never with sealant.

An upstand covers the gap where the worktop meets a wall that is not flat, which is its real job. A full-height piece shows a wall that is out more than an upstand does, over the extra height. A full-height piece behind the hob has to allow for the extractor, so that gets settled first. A good number have a garage attached to the flank wall with a door through from the kitchen, which is both a way in and a stretch of wall the run cannot use. The carry is the easy part; the plaster around the old breast and the packing over a moved floor are not. Lath and plaster is not a fixing, and is treated accordingly.