Kitchen worktops in Manor House

Yes. Mostly flats with compact fixed kitchens of 2.4-2.8m and appliances already in position, so replacement runs and upstands are the bread and butter. The Victorian terraces on the side streets give occasional rear-addition kitchens with a bit more length to work with. Loading exemptions on red routes are narrow, time-limited and heavily camera-enforced, so we plan around them rather than relying on them. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. They go in with the first load where the stop is short.

post-war estate block, Victorian terrace, 1930s block and new-build apartment. Many of these had a bathroom or a WC built onto the far end of the addition, so the room now ends at a stud wall rather than at the original brickwork. The day is planned backwards from the hall. Where the wall bellies, the top is eased in against it.

Sitting on a major junction with red route sections and no stopping, so loading goes to the residential streets behind. The older blocks are walk-ups while the newer ones have lifts that need booking through the managing agent. A lift out of service for the day turns a straightforward install into a stair carry, so the slot gets confirmed with whoever manages the building rather than against a calendar. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. The crew size follows from it.

Worktop replacement, worktop splashbacks & upstands and worktop installation, in that order. A specification repeated across several plots has to be repeatable, which quietly rules out the natural stones where no two slabs match. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. Booked at short notice, because the notice is short. Appliance positions are effectively fixed here, so template around the existing hob and sink footprints rather than assuming they can be shifted along the run.

The two runs are rarely the same length, and the shorter one often carries the sink, which puts the cut-outs in the piece with the least material to spare. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. The last piece in has the least tolerance left. A run can measure dead right at both ends and still belly out in the middle, which only appears once the template plots the intermediate points. 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. Behind the boxing it becomes two pieces. Material starts at £110 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting sit on their own lines rather than inside one figure.

Whoever manages the block controls the lift booking, the bin store and the visitor parking, and none of that sits in the gift of the household whose kitchen it is. If the carcasses are tired the honest answer is that stone will find that out, and it is better said before than after. Sequenced around access rather than around the workshop. 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.

The lift, if there is one, is measured on the diagonal, because that is the dimension a long piece actually uses. A join forced by the route still sits over a gable, so it is no poorer a join for that. Car depth is the number that settles it wherever a piece cannot be stood upright, and most residential cars are shallower than the run they are serving. Finding it out on the morning costs the whole slot, because there is no second route to fall back on. Protection goes down along it first.

If the carcasses are corrected, the template is taken again, since a drawing off units that then moved is worthless. Level is checked at the template, which is the point of measuring in the room rather than off a drawing. The check comes before the measuring rather than after, because the whole drawing is set out from that plane. Where a corner is a couple of degrees off, a mitre cut to a theoretical ninety degrees opens on the wall side and there is no closing it afterwards. Where the wall cannot be made good, setting the stone deliberately proud on a subframe with a shadow gap reads as a detail rather than a bad fit. Nothing gets hidden behind a full-height panel.

An old stone top is heavier coming out than the new one is going in, and leaves in sections. The template can be taken with the old top still down, which is why one visit covers both. Disposal means it goes in the van, not into the garden to wait for a collection. The realistic answer on a main road is an early slot, a spotter on the van and pieces staged in one movement rather than several trips. Splashbacks are normally the last thing off, so a short parking window is exactly when they get rushed. Rushing the last piece off the van is how panels break.

An island often runs in one piece where a wall run cannot. There are only ever a few legal positions, and the one taken is furthest from the light. A finished join is typically two to three millimetres, colour-matched and sanded flush. A tall bank of housings at one end takes a chunk out of the working run, so the usable length of that side is always less than the length of the wall behind it. 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.