Kitchen worktops in Rushey Green

Yes. Corbett-built terraces east of the main road with the standard narrow rear addition, 2.4m to 3m galleys until a side return goes in, after which they become 4m kitchen-diners with an island and a rooflight. A controlled parking zone means either a visitor permit sorted in advance or a suspended bay, and a suspension is applied for days ahead rather than on the morning. It rarely changes what we cut, but it does change how the pieces are stacked and strapped for the run out. The load plan follows from it.

late Victorian Corbett terrace, Edwardian terrace and postwar infill flats. A semi has a side passage, and whether it is wide enough to carry a piece flat and turn it in at the back door is the first thing worth measuring. We measure the front door, the hall width and the turn into the kitchen before anything comes off the van, because a 3m piece has to swing through that corner on edge and stone does not bend to help you. The slow parts are slow for a reason.

Long uniform streets with permit bays and no drives, plus shared side passages between pairs of houses that give rear access on some plots but not others. Rear access usually lets us fit longer pieces whole, so the join count ends up decided by the slab rather than by the building. Finding it out on the morning costs the whole slot, because there is no second route to fall back on. That is what the morning is planned around.

Worktop installation, worktop templating and worktop fabrication, in that order. 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. So the nesting is planned around it rather than around a standard kitchen. Same slab run, or it is not a match. Whether there's a side passage decides the job, where one exists you can get a full-length piece into a rear extension without touching the hallway.

The step or level change between the original room and the return is real, and the units need packing before stone goes across it. A layout that has been packed and levelled run by run instead of to one datum shows as a step where two pieces meet. Dry-lay first, always. Window boards and cills stand proud of the plaster, so the back edge of the top has to be plotted to where the units actually sit rather than to the wall. The template drawing carries the real geometry through to the saw, and the piece is machined to it rather than trimmed to it later. Radiused, polished, and clear of the joins. Material runs from £110 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines rather than rolled into one figure.

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 template booked hopefully around another trade is the commonest cause of a wasted visit. No stone is cut from a plan. Tell us the building when you book and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice get built into the day rather than found on it.