Kitchen worktops in Longlands

Yes. Semis and chalet bungalows on the slope down to the Cray valley. Bungalow kitchens are square with low ceilings and sills close to the worktop, while the semis follow the usual rear-kitchen-plus-dining-room plan. A step up from the drive to the threshold turns the last two metres into a lift, and a lift is where two pairs of hands become the minimum. 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. It is why the arrival time is what it is.

1930s semi, interwar chalet bungalow and postwar terrace. 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. The tops go on level even when nothing else is.

Sloping residential roads with drives on most houses, though a few streets narrow sharply toward the railway with little turning space for a long van. The tail lift is still the pinch point, because the piece has to be walked off it onto the trolley while it is sitting at chest height. Worth remembering that the old tops have to come out the way the new ones come in, and a laminate run is easier to remove in one length than to carry in one. The van stands for both movements, not just the delivery.

Worktop replacement and worktop installation, in that order. An open-plan extension puts the worktop in the middle of the living space, so it is looked at from the sofa as well as worked on. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. A plumber either side of us. Low window sills in the bungalows kill a standard 100mm upstand, so measure sill height at template stage.

A galley closed at one end takes a short return across the top, and that little piece carries the same edge work, the same handling and nearly the same cost as a full length. A layout that has been packed and levelled run by run instead of to one datum shows as a step where two pieces meet. The last piece in has the least tolerance left. Casement handles and stays swing down into the space above the worktop, so the clearance that counts is the one measured with the window open. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. It was there long before we were. Expect material from £110 per square metre supply only, with templating, fabrication and fitting itemised on their own lines rather than folded into one figure.

Where two people share the decision it helps to know early which of them is settling the edge profile and which is settling the budget, because it is rarely the same person for both. A replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. One day out of use, agreed in advance. Mention the building when you book. The lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice then go into the plan instead of turning up on the day.

The lift, if there is one, is measured on the diagonal, because that is the dimension a long piece actually uses. What decides it is not the width of the stairwell but the length of piece that can be turned in it. The alternative to a join is a shorter run, which is usually the wrong thing to trade away. Suction lifters need a clean dry face to hold, so in the wet the pads come off and the piece goes back to being carried on webbing by hand. We plan the strip-out and the carry as one movement so the kitchen is only out of use for a single day. A laminate run comes out easier than stone goes in.

An old stone top is heavier coming out than the new one is going in, and leaves in sections. Tiling bonded to the wall behind usually comes away with the old top, so that wall is agreed beforehand. Old tops are screwed or glued from underneath, so the drawer boxes come out before the worktop does. Where the van cannot turn on the plot it has to arrive already facing the right way, so the approach along the street is part of the plan. 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 day is built around that window.

A finished join is typically two to three millimetres, colour-matched and sanded flush. Dark and heavily veined stone shows a join more than a pale even one, which is worth knowing before the slab is picked. Join count and position are settled from the template drawing rather than improvised on the fitting day. Walls at both ends mean two scribes on every piece, and a run that has to drop between two fixed points has no tolerance left to give away. Joins are pulled with suction clamps and finished flush, then colour-matched, which is the last thing done rather than the first. Access is checked against the longest piece first.

Marble is the one people underestimate. It is porous, like granite, and wants sealing. Quartz carries resin, so a hot pan wants a trivet, while granite and sintered stone will take one without complaint. Quartz and sintered stone never need sealing: quartz is non-porous and sintered stone has effectively zero porosity. The floor is a solid slab with a screed over it, which is stable underfoot and rarely flat across a long run. The carry is the easy part; the plaster around the old breast and the packing over a moved floor are not. What the building will take decides how it is fixed.