Splashbacks and upstands in Northwick Park

Yes. Northwick Park is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are HA1, HA3. It is worked on our north west London run, along with the rest of Harrow. A drive that shelves towards the house needs the van chocked and the trolley controlled, since a loaded A-frame gathers speed quickly on a slope. Upstands travel in a crate and can wait on the van, which gives some flexibility a full-height panel does not. That is why they are crated the way they are. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

These blocks were built with a lift from new, which will usually take a worktop and almost never takes a full-length island piece. Boxed risers break the run into returns, and every return is a separate piece with its own mitred corner. Decided before fabrication starts. Rental refits want the fewest possible visits, so template, fabricate and fit needs sequencing tightly around tenancy change dates.

Flat, wide roads with drives on the houses; the flat blocks have communal entrances, half-landings and generally no lift, which limits piece size to what two people can turn on a stair. Communal stairs get boarded and the handrail padded, and we walk the route with a tape before the first piece leaves the van. 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. 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. Splashbacks and upstands are cut from the same slab run at the same time, which is the only way the batch actually matches. 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. Ordered later from a different batch, the match is not reliable exactly where the pieces meet. Sockets final before template.

Two parallel runs with a walkway between them is the most efficient shape there is on a slab, because both pieces nest as straight lengths with almost no waste. 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. The joint to the worktop is siliconed, never grouted. 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. 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. An upstand rides what a panel exposes. 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 let property is specified for durability and for a fixed window, and both of those are legitimate reasons to choose differently. Splashbacks are cut from the same slab run as the tops, so they have to be decided before fabrication, not after. Decided before fabrication, not after.