Splashbacks and upstands in Old Bexley

Yes. Old Bexley is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are DA5. It is worked on our south east London run, along with the rest of Bexley. Where the van can pull up level with the gate the pieces are handled the fewest times, which is what actually protects them. 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.

A two-up two-down has a kitchen that was never designed to be one, so the run is short, the ceiling is low and every millimetre of depth gets argued over. A 100mm upstand bedded on silicone is the honest answer where the plaster bows, because it rides what a tall panel exposes. Decided before fabrication starts. In the old cottages, door and beam heights matter as much as widths, a slab on edge won't always clear the lintel.

A narrow conservation-area high street with a level crossing, restricted parking and no rear access to the older cottages, so deliveries have to be timed around the barrier and the school run. 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. Where the route is tight we break a long splashback at a natural vertical joint instead of forcing one panel through. Joint positions follow from that.

Not particularly, and it would be easy to pretend otherwise. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop templating, worktop fabrication and worktop replacement. That is a statement about the local housing rather than about the work. It is quoted, cut and fitted exactly the same way here as anywhere else on the patch. 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. 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. Rear and side-return extensions are where the islands appear, and an island is the piece that decides whether one slab does the kitchen or two. Splashbacks and upstands are cut from the same slab run at the same time, which is the only way the batch actually matches. Sockets final before template.

Seating overhangs past roughly 300mm will not carry on the carcass alone, so flat steel bar or a plywood substrate has to be built into the units first. 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.

A junction between an original floor and a later extension slab is almost never at the same level, so units carrying a run across it need packing first. 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. Make the wall good first, or accept the detail. The chimney breast recess must be replastered and fully dry, and the hob and extractor positions fixed, before anyone templates a full-height piece into it. The same building type can arrive as a careful one-off kitchen or as a fast turnaround, and the honest answer is that they are priced differently. Full-height panels need the wall made good first, which is another trade and another timescale. Decided before fabrication, not after.