Reception counters and desks in Regent's Park

Yes. Regent's Park is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are NW1. It is worked on our central and north London run, along with the rest of Camden. The van is not staying on a main road for the day, so once the stone is off it goes and parks properly somewhere else. A commercial frontage rarely has anywhere to stop, so the unload is timed rather than assumed and the counter pieces come off first. Packaging leaves with us rather than filling the lobby. Template and fit both happen at the property, so there is nothing to drive to and nothing to collect.

A basement kitchen has a flagged or concrete floor laid straight onto the ground, so it is solid, cold and rarely within ten millimetres of level. That entrance is what caps the counter, because a shopfront door and the step in front of it will take far less than a full-length top, so the run is broken over a support in the carcass rather than gambled on. A stair off the pavement caps what can be turned onto the landing. Where a corner is a couple of degrees off, a mitre cut to a theoretical ninety degrees opens on the wall side and there is no closing it afterwards. A counter is worse off than a kitchen here, because it usually stands clear of the wall and has nothing behind it to hide a gap. The counter is scribed to the carcass, and the carcass to the floor.

Spindles and a newel cap stand proud of the string, so the usable width on a turn is measured to the handrail rather than to the wall behind it. The lower transaction shelf is short and easily handled; it is the upper counter that has to be walked in on edge and turned at every corner. A polished front edge travels facing inward, always. A red route means no stopping, and no stopping means exactly that, so the stone comes in from a side street or from a bay behind the property. Loading bays belonging to the building are booked by whoever holds the lease, and that is seldom whoever ordered the counter. A bay suspension is a line on the quote, not a surprise.

Honestly, no, though it would be easy to claim otherwise. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop templating, worktop design & quotation and worktop installation. That says something about the housing round here, not about the work. Quote, cut and fit are the same here as on any other part of the patch. The junction between the original room and the extension is the point to watch, because the two floors rarely sit at the same height. Where an operator is fitting out several receptions, the counters come off one slab run so the desks read as a set rather than as neighbours. Where the lobby stays open, the work runs outside opening hours. 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. A fit-out programme puts the counter last, behind the joiner and the electrician, which is exactly when the least time is left to template it. A spare offcut kept back can save a whole counter later.

Where a run finishes hard against a wall the last few millimetres are scribed, and where it finishes in open floor it is cut square and polished, which is two different jobs on one length. A counter has the same argument in miniature: a straight run nests kindly on a slab, and every return costs yield. Setting out starts at the entrance end and works inward. Reckon on £110 to £550 per square metre for the material supply only, with templating, fabrication and fitting itemised separately.

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. What a counter is scribed to is the joiner's carcass rather than the plaster, which is why it is templated after the carcass is fixed and never before. A counter standing proud of the wall has nothing to hide behind. Send photographs taken walking from the pavement through the door to where the counter will stand, along with the carcass dimensions once the joiner has fixed it. Mixed ownership means the decision-maker is not always the person who lets us in, so it is worth being clear early about who signs the quote off. The same split runs through commercial property: a landlord fitting out a shell and a tenant fitting out their own reception want different things from one counter. A managed lobby has rules the counter has to be carried under.

Stone does not flex, so a run that rocks on its carcasses rocks just as badly once it is stone. Level is checked at the template, which is the point of measuring in the room rather than off a drawing. Packing takes up small variation. It is not there to hide something that belongs in the units. A room can be out of square in both directions at once, so the wall that leans is also the wall that runs downhill, and one scribe cannot answer both. A lobby wall that leans shows itself along the back return, so that edge is cut to the line the wall actually takes. The carcass is levelled before the top is ever offered up.

The workmanship guarantee runs 5 years on every kitchen we fit. Damage found on the bench never leaves the workshop, and damage on the carry is remade under the same cover. Most breakages happen on the carry, which is why the route is walked and measured before anything comes off the van. The top step is rarely the end of it, because a door swinging out onto the landing has to be held back before a piece can come off the flight. A lobby is one of the few places a piece can be staged, so the counter comes in early and stands on trestles until the carcass is ready for it. The counter is the last thing in and the first thing looked at.

What you get is a line rather than a step, because the pieces are levelled to each other first. Dark and heavily veined stone shows a join more than a pale even one, which is worth knowing before the slab is picked. A join sits over a cabinet gable. It never spans a gap and never runs through a cut-out. A doorway partway along one wall breaks that side into two separate pieces, and two short pieces cost more between them than the single long one they replace. The return between the high counter and the low shelf never nests neatly, and it is what decides how much slab the desk swallows. A counter reads as one plane or as several, and that is a drawing decision.

The template can be taken with the old top still down, which is why one visit covers both. If you want the old top kept for a garage or a utility, say so and it stays on site. Taking the old tops off and disposing of them is its own line on the quote rather than something folded into the stone price. Where the frontage is a clearway the unload happens away from the door and the carry gets longer, which is a crew and time question rather than a stone one. The upper counter is the longest piece on the van, so the tail lift needs the full swing radius clear on the pavement. Two heights, one unload, one trip across the pavement.