Kitchen worktops in Joydens Wood

Yes. Detached houses and chalet bungalows on wooded plots, most extended over the years, kitchens tend to be wide rather than long, with an island and a separate utility, and older properties often have split levels where extensions were added. 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. The first hand off the van is the one holding the clock.

interwar woodland plot housing, postwar detached and chalet bungalow and 1960s-70s estate. The kitchen sits at the back with a door to the garden and a window over the sink, and both are on the wall the run wants. 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. Settlement is packed out, never levered out.

Unadopted and private roads in places, wooded sloping plots, long drives and heavy tree cover, so a large van cannot always reach the door. A short hard approach with no steps means a full-length piece can be walked in flat by two people rather than turned up on edge. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. We would sooner lift a gate off its hinges than force a piece past it.

Worktop installation, in that order. Extension budgets are usually well spent by the time the worktop is ordered, which is where the choice between quartz and a thinner sintered stone actually gets made. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Fire doors stay shut, so the carry route is longer. Several roads here are unmade, check the approach in the wet before promising a delivery date.

The offcut taken out of the middle for a hob is a large usable piece, and it is worth deciding early whether it becomes an upstand or goes in the skip. 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. A chimney breast left in place splits a wall into two alcoves, and the two are rarely the same width and rarely parallel to each other. Rushing that is what leaves a gap you look at every morning for fifteen years. The awkward metre takes the longest. Material starts at £110 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting sit on their own lines rather than inside one figure.

An owner living in the house makes the decisions and lives with them, so the specification tends to go towards the material rather than towards the lowest total. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. Access rules can differ from one door to the next. Let us know the building when you book, and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice are handled beforehand rather than on the fitting day.

Old tops are screwed or glued from underneath, so the drawer boxes come out before the worktop does. The sink and hob are lifted out with the old top and kept aside if you are reusing them. If you want the old top kept for a garage or a utility, say so and it stays on site. 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. It is why the arrival time is what it is.

On a porous stone the grooved area is sealed with the rest, and it gets wet more than anything else. A groove set is its own item on the quote rather than something rolled in with the sink cut-out. A shallow bay or a squared-off rear window means the run beneath it is rarely the same depth at both ends. Almost everything that makes a fitting day hard is a property of the building rather than of the stone. The join is polished flat before we call it done.

The fitting itself is one visit: a plain run is a morning, an island with splashbacks takes most of the day. On the fitting day floors and door frames are protected, joins clamped flush, sink and hob sealed. Nothing changes hands until after the template. Suspended floors at the front meet a solid slab in the extension somewhere in the middle, and the units sit across the change. Protection down, dry-lay, scribe, then bond: the order matters more in a difficult room than an easy one. Old plaster gets scribed to, never fought with.

What moves the figure after templating is a change you make: a different edge, an extra cut-out, a bigger sink chosen late. Plumbing, gas and electrical work are not in the figure, because we do not do them. Alcove pieces get cut oversize on both scribe edges, with the true wall angles carried on the template drawing rather than assumed. The back edge is eased in progressively rather than offered up once and forced. The scribe is cut on site or it is not cut.