Worktop installation in Strand

Yes. Strand is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are WC2R, WC2N. It is worked on our central London run, along with the rest of Westminster. A single red line has hours and a double red line does not, and the difference decides whether an early start is a plan or a penalty. 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. The work comes to you. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, with nothing to visit or collect.

Half-landings mean the back of the house sits at a slightly different level from the front, and a knocked-through kitchen crosses that line. 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. 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. The notch is eased until it drops, then bonded.

The lift is only part of the route, and the corridor from the lobby to the flat door often holds a tighter turn than the car does. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. It gets checked before the first piece is lifted. Where a marked loading box sits on the red route the stop is legal but timed, so the unload runs as one movement with every hand on it. 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.

Often enough. It is one of the three, behind worktop fabrication. The template, the workshop and the installers are the same either way. The junction between the original room and the extension is the point to watch, because the two floors rarely sit at the same height. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Fire doors stay shut, so the carry route is longer. 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. 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.

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. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. Pieces are carried in the order they are laid. The supply-only figure for material runs £110 to £550 per square metre, and templating, fabrication and fitting are lines of their own.

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. The back edge is eased in progressively rather than offered up once and forced. Two millimetres at the wall is two millimetres you see. 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. An owner living in the house makes the decisions and lives with them, so the specification tends to go towards the material rather than towards the lowest total. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. The slot belongs to whoever can open the door.

A Belfast or butler sink has to be installed and at its final height before the template, because the stone is cut to sit on it. Where the hob lands is set out against the units and the wall behind, not off the kitchen plan. A galley puts the sink on one side and the hob on the other, which spreads the cut-outs across two pieces instead of weakening one. A layout that has been packed and levelled run by run instead of to one datum shows as a step where two pieces meet. The return is offered up last.

The design and quotation visit is free and carries no obligation, so a figure exists before any commitment. Cut-outs, edge profile and join count are itemised, so taking one out removes a line rather than starting an argument. What is quoted is what the drawing says, and the figure does not move unless the drawing does. A boxed soil stack or service riser in the corner of a run eats into the worktop depth and has to be scribed around rather than cut square. It adds an hour or two to the day, and that time sits in the schedule rather than being taken out of the finishing. Nothing bears on plasterboard.

The grooves sit inside the depth of the top with stone left either side, so a shallow run limits them. Machining is permanent. If a later kitchen moves the sink, the grooves stay where they were cut. Chimney breasts and the alcoves either side of them break the run into short pieces before anyone has drawn a kitchen. The fitting day is planned backwards from all of it, before the first piece comes off the van. A settled floor adds an hour and the day allows for it.

If the units run late the template moves, not the fit: the gap between them is fabrication. The fit follows 5 to 10 working days after the template, and nothing is cut before that visit because nothing is cut from a plan. Money does not move until the template is done. The original front door is narrow and the hall is often the only way in, which puts a ceiling on the longest single piece. Almost everything that makes a fitting day hard is a property of the building rather than of the stone. Door fronts and stone edges get checked against each other first.