Reception counters and desks in Mill Hill

Yes. Mill Hill is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are NW7. It is worked on our north London run, along with the rest of Barnet. 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 commercial frontage rarely has anywhere to stop, so the unload is timed rather than assumed and the counter pieces come off first. Crew size follows the distance from the van to the lobby. Nothing needs visiting and nothing needs collecting: the template is in your kitchen and so is the fit.

Ceiling beams cross the room at a height that decides where a piece can be stood on edge and where it cannot. Large houses in these streets get converted into clinics, nurseries, small offices and members' rooms, and the reception ends up in a hall that was never meant to hold a desk. Protected finishes decide the fixings before the drawing is finished. Old breasts carry a bulge low down where the original opening was closed up, and the units stand off it before the stone is measured at all. A counter is worse off than a kitchen here, because it usually stands clear of the wall and has nothing behind it to hide a gap. The counter is scribed to the carcass, and the carcass to the floor.

A height barrier on the car park entrance rules out a tail-lift van outright, and the stone then transfers to a trolley at the barrier itself. A counter top is one long piece with no run of cabinets to break it, so the route decides the join count before the sightlines get a vote. Working out of hours costs less than a chipped counter does. A drive behind an electric gate depends on somebody being in to open it and on the gate staying open while the load comes off. Loading bays belonging to the building are booked by whoever holds the lease, and that is seldom whoever ordered the counter. Trolleys cross block paving badly, so boards go down first.

Not really, and there is no sense dressing it up. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop design & quotation, worktop installation and worktop fabrication. That is a statement about the local housing rather than about the work. It gets quoted, cut and fitted exactly as it would anywhere else on the patch. The junction between the original room and the extension is the point to watch, because the two floors rarely sit at the same height. Counters are nearly always one-offs, so the saving that comes from repeating a specification is not usually on the table here. Reception work is booked around the building staying open. Extension kitchens are usually specified long before they are buildable, so the run lengths on the drawing and the run lengths in the room are different numbers. Where an operator is fitting out several receptions, the counters come off one slab run so the desks read as a set rather than as neighbours. A desk somebody sits at all day is specified for wear.

Where an overhang is too deep for steel on its own the choice is a leg at the end or a bracket underneath, and a bracket that lands where a knee goes is worse than no bracket at all. The return between the high counter and the low shelf never nests neatly, and it is what decides how much slab the desk swallows. The knee recess removes the leg the span was relying on. Stone is £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and the templating, the fabrication and the fitting each carry their own line.

Two alcove pieces will not swap over however similar they look, so they are marked left and right at the bench and stay that way to the van. What a counter is scribed to is the joiner's carcass rather than the plaster, which is why it is templated after the carcass is fixed and never before. A counter standing proud of the wall has nothing to hide behind. Confirm the edge profile and which faces receive it, and tell us whether a screen, hatch or gate forms part of the counter before the carcass is built. Where someone is living in the house through the work, the strip-out and the fit are planned so the kitchen is out of use for a day and not a week. Where a managing agent has to approve the work, the drawing goes out in a form they can sign without ever standing in the lobby. Access and out-of-hours permission sit with the building, not the tenant.

The template is taken in your kitchen after the units are in and fixed, never before. The template produces a drawing, and the workshop cuts to that drawing once you agree it. Templating and fitting are two visits, not one, and the gap between them is when the stone is actually cut. Deep skirtings, a dado and a picture rail survive in the original rooms, so nothing sits flat to the wall without being cut around first. Two working surfaces at two heights, a return between them and clear knee space under the lower one: that is the shape almost every counter ends up being, whatever the front elevation promised. The counter is drawn to the carcass, and the carcass is measured first.

A join cannot cross a cut-out, so a sink mid-run takes away the position you would have used. Join count and position are settled from the template drawing rather than improvised on the fitting day. Slabs come in finite sizes, so a long run needs a join whatever the room looks like. A corbel on show under an overhang is a decision about how the piece looks from a stool, so it gets settled alongside the edge profile rather than left to whoever fits it. An external corner on a counter is seen from both sides at once, so it is mitred rather than butted and the pattern is carried round it. Two planes, one drawing, one setting-out point.

The alternative stands on the surface, so the choice is losing worktop permanently or only while you are draining. They read strongly across a dark stone and are nearly invisible on a pale one, so look before deciding. The bowl position has to be settled before templating, since the grooves are set out from it. The room has three or four doors and a route through it to the garden, so the work shares the space with everyone else in the house. What decides the piece sizes is the lobby and the way into it, since a counter top runs longer than a kitchen worktop and has no cabinet run to break it up. Two heights and a return, settled before any stone is cut.

Door frames and the stair route are protected too, since most contact happens on the way in. Most breakages happen on the carry, which is why the route is walked and measured before anything comes off the van. The rest of the kitchen still goes in. One damaged piece does not hold up the pieces either side. Concierge buildings want the goods entrance, a booked lift and proof of insurance, all of which is straightforward when it is asked for a week out. A lobby is one of the few places a piece can be staged, so the counter comes in early and stands on trestles until the carcass is ready for it. A long top on edge sweeps wider than the crew carrying it.