Splashbacks and upstands in Kenton

Yes. Kenton is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are HA3, HA9. It is worked on our north west London run, along with the rest of Harrow. A front drive is the best thing that can happen to a fitting day, because the tail lift comes down within a few metres of the door and nothing is on a clock. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. Off the van last, and never in a hurry. You never have to visit anything or collect anything: we template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen.

The kitchen sits on the far side of the hall from the front door, so even with easy access outside there is still a turn to make inside. That leaves a ragged band right where the upstand has to sit, which is fine for a 100mm upstand that covers it, but a full-height splashback needs the wall made good first or it will rock on the high spots. A bowed wall is what decides between an upstand and a panel. Once the carcasses are levelled the gap under the plinth varies along the run, and that varying gap is the honest record of what the floor is doing. It is usually what pushes a job towards a 100mm upstand instead of a full-height panel, because an upstand rides what a panel exposes. Scribed along the top edge as well.

Rear access usually lets us fit longer pieces whole, so the join count ends up decided by the slab rather than by the building. Splashback panels are lighter than a worktop and far more awkward, because a tall thin piece has to be carried on edge and cannot be tilted to clear a turn. That is agreed at template, not on fitting day. 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. Splashbacks are normally the last thing off, so a short parking window is exactly when they get rushed. The crate exists for the walk from the van.

Not especially, and pretending otherwise would be simple enough. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop installation and worktop fabrication. It is a fact about the local housing rather than about the work. The job is quoted, cut and fitted the same way wherever on the patch it lands. Where an annexe has been built or converted, its floor and its walls are newer than the main house and behave differently under the same run. Splashbacks and upstands are cut from the same slab run at the same time, which is the only way the batch actually matches. Sockets move on site far more often than plans do. Extended households run kitchens hard, and that pushes the specification towards granite or sintered stone rather than a light quartz. Ordered later from a different batch, the match is not reliable exactly where the pieces meet. The extension electrician finishes after the drawing did.

A pop-up socket in the surface is one more cut-out through the full thickness, and it wants the same clear space beneath it that a sink does. The same shape decides where splashback pieces break, and a joint in a corner reads as a detail while one in a clear run reads as a mistake. The hob panel is sized after the extractor, not before. Supply-only material is £110 to £550 per square metre, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted separately rather than rolled in.

A wall line that runs level over a floor that does not means the finish closes up on the plinth at one end, which is joinery rather than something the stone can answer. A tall panel that fits at the worktop will stand off the wall at the top unless the wall is dubbed out or the panel is scribed. The obstruction breaks the length, every time. The old tiling must be off and the wall made good and dry before templating, not on fitting day. The decision usually gets made standing in the room rather than at a desk, which is why a slab is worth viewing whole instead of choosing from a sample card. A 100mm upstand is the low-maintenance answer, and full-height stone is the one that has to be committed to early. Plastering finishes on somebody else’s timescale.

The template is taken in your kitchen after the units are in and fixed, never before. 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. Nothing changes hands until after the template. Two runs and a return into a rear extension is the pattern, and the return is the piece that never nests neatly on a slab. What decides between a slim upstand and full-height stone is nearly always the wall rather than the taste. Panel joints land over a unit line, never mid-span.

A sit-on sink and an undermounted one are different cut-outs, so which it is gets settled before the template. We seat and seal the sink and hob on the day; water, waste, gas and electrics are for your plumber and electrician. Where the hob lands is set out against the units and the wall behind, not off the kitchen plan. On a book-matched pair the halves are laid out so the mirror line runs down the length of the piece, and once that line is set the top cannot be turned round to suit anything else. Long runs almost never take a single panel, so the joint positions want agreeing before anything is templated. A joint behind a tap is a joint on show.

If a piece cannot be got in at all, we say so at the template rather than on the day. Where there is a lift, whether it can be booked out and padded matters as much as its size. The alternative to a join is a shorter run, which is usually the wrong thing to trade away. Garden routes carry their own hazards: a drain cover, a step up to a patio, wet decking, or a lawn that will not take a loaded trolley. It is usually the full-height panels rather than the tops that will not make the turn, and that only shows up when they arrive. The panel is sized to the turn, not to the wall alone.

If it is a decision for later, say so at the template: the match is a question about the batch. Upstand or splashback, the stone is cut from the same slab run as the worktop, at the same time, so the batch actually matches. These were built with a separate dining room, and most have had the wall between it and the kitchen taken out with a steel put in above. The ragged band left when old tiles and laminate come off together is what usually decides upstand over full height. Dry lining behind a panel needs a fixing plan of its own.