Splashbacks and upstands in North Woolwich

Yes. North Woolwich is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are E16. It is worked on our east London run, along with the rest of Newham. A free-parking street with cars both sides can still leave the van forty metres away, and that distance is carry, not driving. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. One trip is always better than three. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

Open-plan living makes the kitchen furniture rather than utility, so the island and the run behind it are nested off the same area of slab. The plasterboard is flat enough for a full-height panel; it is the socket positions that cause the trouble. The wall makes that decision, not the brochure. The distance is the difficulty here, so the template and the fit both want to be first job of the day rather than squeezed in after another drop.

It is the far tip of the borough with river crossings as the only southern route, so a mistimed ferry or tunnel queue costs an hour on the schedule. Once there, estate roads are quiet with plenty of kerb space and level access, so the physical unload is easy. The barrier, the entry code and the estate rules decide when a van can get near the door, and none of that is negotiable on the day. 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. Joint positions follow from that.

It is one of the three we do most here, behind worktop replacement. Same template visit, same workshop, same installers either way. A worktop replacement between tenancies is a single-day job by design, because the flat is not earning while it is empty. Ordered later from a different batch, the match is not reliable exactly where the pieces meet. Sockets final before template. Where kitchens turn over between tenancies the priority is a surface that survives a decade of being treated as a chopping board. Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because a cut-out in the wrong place means a new piece. Same batch, same run, same day.

The return piece is the awkward one on a slab: short, full depth, and rarely nesting neatly against the long lengths, so yield rather than area is what moves the material figure. Upstands follow the run exactly, so every internal and external corner is a separate mitred or butted piece. Corners get their own pieces. 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. 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. An upstand rides what a panel exposes. Any socket you intend to move must be moved and re-plastered before templating, because a cut-out in the wrong place means a new piece of stone. A let property is specified for durability and for a fixed window, and both of those are legitimate reasons to choose differently. A 100mm upstand is the low-maintenance answer, and full-height stone is the one that has to be committed to early. Decided before fabrication, not after.