Worktop replacement in Spitalfields

Yes. Spitalfields is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are E1. It is worked on our east London run, along with the rest of Tower Hamlets. The realistic answer on a main road is an early slot, a spotter on the van and pieces staged in one movement rather than several trips. 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. It is a full day at the kerb, not a delivery. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

Rooms are tall with deep window reveals, and a run finishing into a reveal is templated to it rather than assumed square. What the old top has been hiding is usually a floor that settled towards the back and units that were never fixed back to the wall. Units kept, surface changed, one day. You cannot cut a listed house to suit the stone, so the stone gets templated and jointed to suit the house, including a joint mid-run just to get it down the stairs.

Most of the area is a conservation area with a high concentration of listed houses, so any fixings into original fabric and any external hoisting need consent and a careful method. Streets are narrow, largely pedestrianised near the market and loading windows are early morning only, with staircases inside the houses that are steep, winding and original. If a hoist is the only way in then the piece sizes are designed around the opening, and the sash or casement usually has to come out first. We plan the strip-out and the carry as one movement so the kitchen is only out of use for a single day. That is agreed before a plumber is booked.

Not particularly, and it would be easy to pretend otherwise. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop templating, worktop fabrication and worktop design & quotation. That is a statement about the local housing rather than about the work. It is quoted, cut and fitted exactly the same way here as anywhere else on the patch. Conversions put kitchens where the services could be made to reach rather than where they belong, so runs are short and interrupted. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. A day, not a project. 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. 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. Going from a 38mm laminate to 20mm or 30mm stone drops the surface, which shows against tiles, a window board and any freestanding appliance. 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. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. Found at template, not on fit day. 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. Where ownership is split across a building, the common parts belong to someone else and the carry route is negotiated rather than assumed. If the carcasses are tired the honest answer is that stone will find that out, and it is better said before than after. Units kept, surface changed.