Worktop replacement in Strawberry Hill

Yes. Strawberry Hill is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are TW1, TW2. It is worked on our south west London run, along with the rest of Richmond upon Thames. Where the front garden has been paved over completely the van stands close to the house, and the route in is still a standard front door. A replacement is a two-way job, with old tops going out and new stone coming in, so the van needs to stay put across the whole day. The old tops leave in one movement rather than piece by piece. Your part of it happens entirely at home, with nothing to travel to and nothing to bring back.

Where the original steel windows survive at the rear, the frame sits almost flush with the inside face and there is no reveal to lose a joint in. The kitchen is normally the original back room with a later side-return or rear extension bolted on, and that helps us: most pieces can go down the side alley and in through the back door in one length, so we can avoid joins that a front-door route would force. Sound carcasses are the one condition. Level has to hold across the whole room rather than along one wall, or a floor that falls end to end shows as a step where two pieces meet. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. A filler strip is evidence, not decoration.

A level threshold with hard standing outside it is the one arrangement where a full run goes in without a single re-grip. Worth remembering that the old tops have to come out the way the new ones come in, and a laminate run is easier to remove in one length than to carry in one. Old pieces are carried out before new ones are carried in. A front drive is the best thing that can happen to a fitting day, because the tail lift comes down within a few metres of the door and nothing is on a clock. We stage the strip-out so the old tops leave in one trip rather than trickling out across the afternoon. Where the van must move, the waste goes on first.

Not particularly, and it would be easy to pretend otherwise. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop installation. That is a point about the buildings round here, not about the job. The quoting, the cutting and the fitting are identical here to anywhere else we work. Where several adults share the cooking the kitchen is in use most of the day, so a fitting slot has to be agreed with more people than usual. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. Chosen against the doors that are staying. Households sharing a house tend to want two prep areas rather than one, which usually means an island as well as a perimeter run. Old tops out in the morning, new stone down and sealed the same afternoon. Old top out Tuesday, tenant in on Friday.

On a book-matched pair the halves are laid out so the mirror line runs down the length of the piece, and once that line is set the top cannot be turned round to suit anything else. The existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. The old cut-outs prove nothing. The material band is £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

A floor that falls across the depth of a run rather than along it tips the carcasses front to back, and packing the front feet changes the overhang while it fixes the level. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. The stack was boxed in after the kitchen went in. Unlock the side gate and clear the alley of bins, bikes and pots, and arrange a plumber for the sink and an electrician if the hob is hard-wired. A quartz sample left on the counter for a week under the actual kitchen lights settles more arguments than any showroom, and an owner is the only person in a position to do that. A replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. Wear is what the next inventory records.

The sink and hob are lifted out with the old top and kept aside if you are reusing them. An old stone top is heavier coming out than the new one is going in, and leaves in sections. Old tops are screwed or glued from underneath, so the drawer boxes come out before the worktop does. Off-street parking means the van stays put all day, so tools, packers and the offcut we would rather have than not are all within reach. Two loads share the one space here, the old tops waiting to go and the new stone waiting to come in. A skip on the frontage takes the space the van needed.

If the sink or hob changes after the template, the drawing changes first and nothing is cut meanwhile. A tap under a window board still needs room for its handle to lift, which is checked at the template. Where the hob lands is set out against the units and the wall behind, not off the kitchen plan. A waterfall leg is a separate piece bonded to the top on a mitre, so the floor it stands on has to be level enough for that mitre to close along its full height. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. Any overhang gets underpinned first.

A long top on units that were shimmed once and never checked is the commonest version of this, and it is cheap to fix beforehand. Packing takes up small variation. It is not there to hide something that belongs in the units. Levelling belongs in the carcasses, on their own legs and packers. Once the carcasses are levelled the gap under the plinth varies along the run, and that varying gap is the honest record of what the floor is doing. A laminate top was scribed thin at the back to swallow it, and stone cannot be shaved down the same way. A postformed top swallowed the fall. This will not.

Sinks, taps and hobs are yours to buy in any case, and they only have to be in the room for the template. The quote is itemised, so a job where you already hold the slab is the same job with the material line taken off it. A second kitchen or a kitchenette in an annexe is a small job with the same fixed template, fabrication and fitting lines as a large one. A surface swap is the fastest upgrade available on a kitchen that is otherwise sound. The flat earns nothing while it sits empty.