Worktop installation in Selhurst

Yes. Selhurst is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SE25. It is worked on our south London run, along with the rest of Croydon. A market day closes the street to traffic for the morning and hands it back in the afternoon, which moves the visit rather than cancelling it. The fitting slot is set around it, which is why we ask about it when the date is booked and not before we leave the yard. Where there is no space, the plan starts the night before. There is nothing to drive to and nothing to pick up, because both visits are to the property itself.

Ceilings in the principal rooms are three metres or more, so a full-height panel behind a hob is a taller piece here than the same kitchen would need anywhere else. 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. What the building will take decides how it is fixed. A stack boxed diagonally across a corner leaves a triangle of dead space, and the top is cut to that triangle rather than to a square return. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. Mark it, lift it, cut it, offer it up again.

A side gate hung to open outward against a fence post is narrower in use than it measures, and lifting the gate off its hinges is usually the quickest win on the route. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. Banisters and door frames are padded before anything moves. A timed school street shuts the road either side of the school day, so the van goes in between those two windows or it does not go in. A van that has to move mid-fit costs the best part of an hour and takes a man off the tools to do it. The van does not stay on a main road once it is empty.

Not particularly. It would be easy to say yes and leave it there. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop replacement and worktop splashbacks & upstands. 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. Party-wall and lease conditions in a converted building set when noisy work can happen, which shapes the fitting day more than the kitchen does. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Fire doors stay shut, so the carry route is longer. Several units in one building are fitted out to the same drawing, so an error on that drawing is an error repeated in every flat. Where the window is fixed there is no second day to fall back on, so the prep list matters more than usual. The last trade in inherits every delay before it.

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. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. Steel under the overhang before stone goes near it. Material runs £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting each get their own line.

Where the boxing stands proud of the finished wall the upstand behind it has to be broken into separate lengths, because one piece cannot pass it. Rushing that is what leaves a gap you look at every morning for fifteen years. The gap closes on the grinder, not in the sealant gun. Clear the full hall and stairs route of furniture, bikes, coats and stair-gates, and keep the front door propped and unobstructed for the carry. The same building type can arrive as a careful one-off kitchen or as a fast turnaround, and the honest answer is that they are priced differently. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. The room cleared before the crew arrives.

No maintenance visit is built into the job. Soap, water, and on the porous stones a seal. Quartz carries resin, so a hot pan wants a trivet, while granite and sintered stone will take one without complaint. Where a top takes wine, oil and lemon most days, the non-porous materials ask least of the household. A villa cut into flats leaves kitchens in rooms that were never kitchens, with services run to wherever they could physically be made to reach. Scribing takes longer than the carry does, so the quiet half of the day is the half that runs over. The age of the house sets the pace of it.

Nothing is payable in advance of the template. On the fitting day floors and door frames are protected, joins clamped flush, sink and hob sealed. The fitting itself is one visit: a plain run is a morning, an island with splashbacks takes most of the day. A picture rail, a deep skirting and a moulded architrave all sit in the way of anything that assumes flat wall from floor to ceiling. Almost everything that makes a fitting day hard is a property of the building rather than of the stone. The last piece down is the one nearest the door.

A remade piece is cut from the same slab run wherever the slab allows, because a replacement from another batch will not match across a join. A dropped pan years later is a different question, and stone is remade rather than filled either way. Floors and units are protected before anything comes through the door. Where the garden is level and the back door is wide the pieces get staged outside on trestles and brought in one at a time as the fitters are ready for them. Finding it out on the morning costs the whole slot, because there is no second route to fall back on. Four hands or eight is settled before the tail lift drops.

A full-height piece shows a wall that is out more than an upstand does, over the extra height. A full-height piece behind the hob has to allow for the extractor, so that gets settled first. Both are templated after the worktop is down and settled, because they are cut to the wall itself. The flat entrance door and the internal doorways are usually tighter than the communal stairs, which is the opposite of what most people assume. Pieces are stood on edge for the turns and carried flat for the straights, and that sequence is agreed before anything comes off the van. Walked, measured, protected, then lifted.