Worktop replacement in Plaistow

Yes. Plaistow is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are E13. It is worked on our east London run, along with the rest of Newham. Where the bay sits some distance from the core, the carry across the car park is the longest leg of the day and gets boarded and lit. 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. Old tops out and new stone in, both through the same gap. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The bay at the front and the back addition at the rear were built to different standards, and the kitchen is nearly always in the weaker of the two. Lath-and-plaster and bowed brickwork mean we template for scribes rather than straight cuts, and each piece is offered up and eased in rather than dropped straight down. What is under the old top is the real question. Old outside-WC returns leave a stepped wall in the kitchen, and that step is the single most commonly mis-measured thing in these houses.

Dense terraced streets with front gardens but almost no off-street parking, and permit restrictions during the working day mean a dispensation is usually needed to park across a bay for the fit. Hallways are narrow with a stair rising immediately from the front door, so a 3m piece has to be angled in and walked through on edge. Door width, hall width and the diagonal at the turn are three separate measurements, and it is the diagonal that catches people out. 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. The strip-out is planned around it.

It is one of the three we do most here, behind worktop templating. Same template visit, same workshop, same installers either way. A new extension slab is not automatically level, and that wants checking before templating rather than after the stone is cut. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. Sound carcasses or it does not go ahead. The junction between the original room and the extension is the point to watch, because the two floors rarely sit at the same height. Old tops out in the morning, new stone down and sealed the same afternoon. A day, not a project.

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 existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. Height change is checked before we cut. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

The stone carries the scribe because the wall cannot be persuaded, so back edges are cut oversize and eased in rather than dropped straight down. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. It is the usual surprise, and it is a known one. Have a plumber booked to disconnect the sink, tap and waste first thing and reconnect after we have gone, and clear the hallway and stairs completely so we can carry slabs through the house. Consent for the work sits with the freeholder or the managing body, and getting it in writing first avoids a crew arriving to a locked door. A plumber disconnects before we arrive and reconnects after we leave, and that is worth booking early. Plumber either side of us.