Worktop replacement in Paddington

Yes. Paddington is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are W2. It is run from the Watford side, covering Hertfordshire & North London. Underground loading has a height restriction, and a van with an A-frame on it is taller than the driver remembers. Waste is the part people forget: the old laminate or tired granite has to be walked back to the van and it does not get lighter. The waste run is planned, not improvised. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

Boxed soil stacks and ventilation ducts run behind the units, and the boxing depth changes between floor level and worktop height. The room itself is the easy part: walls are plumb, corners are square and the floor is flat, so scribes are minimal and joins can be tight. What is under the old top is the real question. Concierge slots are short, so the whole slab set has to be on site in one movement - stage it kerbside first rather than making three trips to the van.

These towers run a full logistics process - book the loading bay off the estate road, a two-hour slot, ID and RAMS to concierge, protection in the lift, and no works outside 8am to 6pm weekdays. Some blocks require materials to go through a basement service corridor rather than the residential lobby. Where the parking court sits behind the block the carry crosses open ground and gets boarded, because loaded trolleys and block paving do not agree. With no room to turn, the old top gets cut up in the kitchen instead, which is dusty work and needs the room emptied first. It sets what the day actually looks like. Tell us what the approach looks like when you book the template and it gets built into the day rather than discovered on it.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop installation and worktop templating. Housings and integrated appliances are set out for a 38mm laminate top, so dropping to 20mm or 30mm stone changes the clearances and needs checking before anything is cut. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. A plumber either side of us. Upgrading a builder-finish kitchen is mostly a swap, so the cost sits in the material choice rather than in the shape of the room. Old tops out in the morning, new stone down and sealed the same afternoon. A plumber either side of us.

Peninsulas frequently land on a lightweight partition or on units that were never fixed down, and stone needs proper support under it before it goes on. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. The units stay, the surface changes. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

A lightweight stud partition will not carry a breakfast bar or a peninsula end, and stone finds that out faster than laminate ever did. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. It is the usual surprise, and it is a known one. Book the service lift, loading bay and concierge access for the full day, and confirm the building's permitted working hours in writing. A street with houses in single occupation next to the same houses cut into flats produces two completely different jobs from the same elevation. A replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. Sound carcasses are the condition.