Splashbacks and upstands in Knightsbridge

Yes. Knightsbridge is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SW1X. It is worked on our central London run, along with the rest of Westminster. Where the van can pull up level with the gate the pieces are handled the fewest times, which is what actually protects them. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. Handling is where these pieces get damaged. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

These kitchens are full of boxed soil stacks, gas risers and heating pipework, and the boxing usually stops short of the ceiling. Each return needs its own piece with a mitred or butted external corner, and those pieces should come off the same slab so the movement lines up across the corner. The wall makes that decision, not the brochure. Nothing gets cut on site in these buildings, so the template must be dimensionally exact including appliance clearances - one wrong cut-out means a full replacement slab, not a rework.

Buildings run 24-hour security and a strict delivery protocol - vehicle booked in, ID for every fitter, protection down through the lobby and lift, and noisy works restricted to a defined window. Some buildings insist all cutting happens off site with zero exceptions. Where the lift will not take the longest run we design a join in rather than gamble, because a piece that will not go up has to go back on the van. 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. Joint positions follow from that.

Not particularly, and it would be easy to pretend otherwise. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop design & quotation, worktop fabrication and worktop installation. That is a statement about the local housing rather than about the work. It is quoted, cut and fitted exactly the same way here as anywhere else on the patch. Landlord work is scheduled around void periods, so the whole thing is a fixed window and the template date matters as much as the fitting date. Ordered later from a different batch, the match is not reliable exactly where the pieces meet. Same batch, same run, same day. Quartz suits let property well: no sealing, no annual maintenance, and nothing an incoming tenant has to be told to look after. Splashbacks and upstands are cut from the same slab run at the same time, which is the only way the batch actually matches. Siliconed to the worktop, never grouted.

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. 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. Joint placement is a decision, not an accident. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

Anything that has to stay accessible, a stopcock, a gas meter, a riser panel, is marked on the template so the stone is cut around it instead of over it. 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. Scribed, dubbed out, or set proud. Pick one. The riser boxing must be finished in its final form and any access panel positions agreed before the template, since the stone is set out around them. A street with houses in single occupation next to the same houses cut into flats produces two completely different jobs from the same elevation. Splashbacks are cut from the same slab run as the tops, so they have to be decided before fabrication, not after. The wall has to be ready.