Worktop templating in Highams Park

Yes. Highams Park is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are E4. It is worked on our east London run, along with the rest of Waltham Forest. 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. It is noted on the job sheet at template so the fitting crew inherit the answer rather than rediscovering it. Two hours is the realistic figure. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The classic arrangement is the original back room with a later extension bolted onto it, so the kitchen is two ages of building in one room. The sill height over the sink is settled on site, because there is often less clearance than an upstand is tall. No stone is ever cut from a plan. The crossing is the only real obstacle here; after that these are straightforward, square, well-built rooms that template cleanly.

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 templater measures that route on the same visit, so the drawing leaves site already knowing the maximum piece. It goes on the drawing with the run dimensions.

It is one of the three we do most here, behind worktop installation. Same template visit, same workshop, same installers either way. 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. The template visit is booked once the units are genuinely in, not when they are nearly in. Units fitted, fixed and level first. A new extension slab is not automatically level, and that wants checking before templating rather than after the stone is cut. Two to three hours on site, with the sink, tap and hob physically present. The room as it is, not as it was drawn.

If the island is a few hundred millimetres longer than the usable length of a slab, a second slab gets bought to gain that overhang, and the whole slab is paid for rather than the part used. Join positions and vein direction are marked on the template drawing before it leaves site. Real angles, not plan angles. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

Alcove pieces get cut oversize on both scribe edges, with the true wall angles carried on the template drawing rather than assumed. The template plots it as it is, at the exact height the worktop will sit, and the drawing carries that through. Measured at worktop height, nowhere else. All base units in, including anything standing on the later extension slab, walls skimmed to final thickness, and the sink, tap and hob delivered so cut-outs and tap centres are set from the actual items. Owner-occupied kitchens are usually being done once, which is why the edge profile, the vein direction and where a join falls are worth the conversation. A template booked hopefully around another trade is the commonest cause of a wasted visit. Fitted, fixed and level, then we come.