Splashbacks and upstands in Palmers Green

Yes. Palmers Green is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are N13. It is worked on our north London run, along with the rest of Enfield. Without a bay the van ends up on a single yellow with a crew member watching it, which takes a pair of hands off the carry. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. Off the van last, and never in a hurry. Both visits happen in your kitchen, the template and the fit, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

Ceilings are high in these, so wall unit heights and splashback heights are open choices rather than things the room has already decided. Lath-and-plaster on the party wall and the chimney breast returns almost never runs true, so a 100mm upstand bedded on silicone is the honest answer here, it rides the bow and hides the junction the worktop can never close on its own. Sockets in a stud wall move more easily than sockets in brick. Where a run finishes into a reveal, the depth of that reveal is taken at worktop height and nowhere else. 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. Each obstruction is another joint, and it is priced as one.

A step up to a patio or a raised threshold at the back door means the piece is lifted rather than rolled, and that is where the crew size gets decided. 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. A tall panel cannot be tilted to clear a turn, so it is sized not to need to. Enforcement zones rarely accept a trade van unloading stone as an exemption, so this gets sorted before the date is confirmed rather than argued about afterwards. Splashbacks are normally the last thing off, so a short parking window is exactly when they get rushed. The crate exists for the walk from the van.

Not particularly. It would be easy to say yes and leave it there. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop installation. That is about what people have here rather than how it gets done. It is quoted, cut and fitted exactly the same way here as anywhere else on the patch. Two households cooking in one kitchen means two of most things, and the run has to carry a second sink or a second oven without losing its working length. Ordered later from a different batch, the match is not reliable exactly where the pieces meet. Upstands turn batch offcuts into finished rooms. An annexe kitchen is often built to keep a parent independent, so worktop height and reach matter as much as the material does. Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because a cut-out in the wrong place means a new piece. The cheap way to make eight kitchens look specified.

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. Long runs almost never take a single panel, so the joint positions want agreeing before anything is templated. A galley shows both walls at the same time. Material runs £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting each get their own line.

Sill height gets settled with the template on site, because it is one of the few dimensions nobody has measured before we arrive. A tall panel that fits at the worktop will stand off the wall at the top unless the wall is dubbed out or the panel is scribed. The panel takes its height off the steel. 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. An owner paying for this directly tends to want the reasoning as much as the number, so a quote that explains why a join sits where it does is worth more than a cheaper one that does not. A 100mm upstand is the low-maintenance answer, and full-height stone is the one that has to be committed to early. A deferred splashback still comes off this drawing.

Each join is an item on the drawing, so the layout and the figure move together. Slabs come in finite sizes, so a long run needs a join whatever the room looks like. A join cannot cross a cut-out, so a sink mid-run takes away the position you would have used. 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. Upstands follow the run exactly, so every internal and external corner is a separate mitred or butted piece. Return ends are polished, not left sawn.

An external stair, a side return or a rear garden counts as carry and is measured the same way. Hoisting through a window is occasionally the answer, and it is a decision made at the template, not improvised on the fitting day. The lift, if there is one, is measured on the diagonal, because that is the dimension a long piece actually uses. A side gate and a back door mean the stone never goes through the house at all, which keeps the dust and most of the risk outside. It is usually the full-height panels rather than the tops that will not make the turn, and that only shows up when they arrive. Panels are carried on edge from the tail lift to the wall.

Packing takes up small variation. It is not there to hide something that belongs in the units. Variation past what packing can take up has to be corrected in the carcasses before we cut, because the template records the units as they stand. If the carcasses are corrected, the template is taken again, since a drawing off units that then moved is worthless. A window board sitting below finished worktop height leaves two choices, drop the top under it or notch the stone around it, and both cost more than a straight run. 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. Upstands sit tight because both edges are cut.

Delivery to the workshop has to be arranged and dated, since nothing is nested until it is there. Sinks, taps and hobs are yours to buy in any case, and they only have to be in the room for the template. A family adding a self-contained unit is paying for the whole conversion, and the worktop is one line in a much longer job. Upstands are the cheapest way to finish several kitchens consistently, and they come out of the offcuts the tops leave behind. Wipe-down beats sealed grout on a turnaround.