Splashbacks and upstands in Stratford

Yes. Stratford is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are E15. It is worked on our east London run, along with the rest of Newham. The practical answer is to check the fixture list before the date is offered, because a template slot lost to a road closure cannot be recovered that week. Panels come off the van in one trip where possible, since a tall piece handled repeatedly is a piece asking to be chipped. Two hands and a clear route, or it waits on the van. The template happens in your kitchen and so does the fit, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The chimney breast is usually still standing with the opening blocked up, and the alcoves either side of it are rarely the same width as each other. A 100mm upstand bedded on silicone is the honest answer where the plaster bows, because it rides what a tall panel exposes. What the plaster is stuck to matters more than its colour. 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. It is usually what pushes a job towards a 100mm upstand instead of a full-height panel, because an upstand rides what a panel exposes. Each obstruction is another joint, and it is priced as one.

Handrails, mirrors and a sloping ceiling panel all eat into the usable diagonal, and none of them appear on a lift specification sheet. Splashback panels are lighter than a worktop and far more awkward, because a tall thin piece has to be carried on edge and cannot be tilted to clear a turn. That is agreed at template, not on fitting day. Where an event closes the road entirely, the van cannot be moved once it is in, which is a different problem from not being able to park at all. Splashbacks are normally the last thing off, so a short parking window is exactly when they get rushed. The longer the walk, the fewer the panels per trip.

It is one of the three we do most here, behind worktop replacement. Whichever it is, the template and the fitters do not change. Upgrading a builder-finish kitchen is mostly a swap, so the cost sits in the material choice rather than in the shape of the room. Splashbacks and upstands are cut from the same slab run at the same time, which is the only way the batch actually matches. Less to clean, for whoever cleans it. Handover-spec kitchens are square, plumb and predictable, which means the join count is honest and driven by run length rather than by the building. Ordered later from a different batch, the match is not reliable exactly where the pieces meet. Panels for every unit, cut in one go.

A run that stops in mid-air at the open end needs a finished end rather than a cut one, and that end takes the same edge work as the whole front. The same shape decides where splashback pieces break, and a joint in a corner reads as a detail while one in a clear run reads as a mistake. Scribe to the wall rather than stretch the panel. Supply-only material is £110 to £550 per square metre, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted separately rather than rolled in.

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. A tall panel that fits at the worktop will stand off the wall at the top unless the wall is dubbed out or the panel is scribed. The panel takes its height off the steel. The chimney breast recess must be replastered and fully dry, and the hob and extractor positions fixed, before anyone templates a full-height piece into it. 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. A 100mm upstand is the low-maintenance answer, and full-height stone is the one that has to be committed to early. The wall has to be ready.

The fitting itself is one visit: a plain run is a morning, an island with splashbacks takes most of the day. If the units run late the template moves, not the fit: the gap between them is fabrication. The same firm templates and fits. Nobody else is brought in to install. The original front door is narrow and the hall is often the only way in, which puts a ceiling on the longest single piece. What decides between a slim upstand and full-height stone is nearly always the wall rather than the taste. Window reveals decide where the run of stone stops.

A remake goes back through the same cutting and polishing, so it is a return visit rather than a patch. Most breakages happen on the carry, which is why the route is walked and measured before anything comes off the van. Door frames and the stair route are protected too, since most contact happens on the way in. A lift out of service for the day turns a straightforward install into a stair carry, so the slot gets confirmed with whoever manages the building rather than against a calendar. It is usually the full-height panels rather than the tops that will not make the turn, and that only shows up when they arrive. The panel is sized to the turn, not to the wall alone.

On a replacement the old top comes off in the morning and the new stone is down and sealed the same day. An old stone top is heavier coming out than the new one is going in, and leaves in sections. Disposal means it goes in the van, not into the garden to wait for a collection. 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. Upstands travel in a crate and can wait on the van, which gives some flexibility a full-height panel does not. A narrow gap between parked cars decides how a panel turns.

The bowl position has to be settled before templating, since the grooves are set out from it. They are cut with a fall towards the bowl, which is why they cannot be added on site later. Grooves are machined into the surface rather than applied to it, so there is nothing to come loose later. There is usually a step down into the back addition, so the kitchen floor and the hall floor are not the same level and neither of them is flat. Splashbacks come off the same slab run as the tops, which means the decision has to be made before fabrication starts. The extractor position is measured before the panel is drawn.