Worktop fabrication in Temple Fortune

Yes. Temple Fortune is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are NW11. It is worked on our north London run, along with the rest of Barnet. Underground loading has a height restriction, and a van with an A-frame on it is taller than the driver remembers. Pieces are loaded in reverse fitting order so the first thing off the van is the first thing that goes down. It is decided in the yard, not at the kerb. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The classic arrangement is the original back room with a later extension bolted onto it, so the kitchen is two ages of building in one room. Where a full length can come down the side and in at the back, the nest follows the slab instead of the building. Every join over a gable, clear of every cut-out. Sloping ceilings over part of the run mean the slab cannot be tilted upright at that end, so it has to enter the room already close to horizontal.

Flats over the parades are reached by narrow shared stairs from the rear yards, with no lift and a turn at each landing; Finchley Road frontage has loading restrictions and constant bus traffic. A walk-up with winders at every half-landing means the piece is rested and re-gripped on the way, so the crew size goes up before the piece size comes down. So the nesting is worked to the measured route first and to the slab second. The drawing carries that decision through to the saw.

Not particularly, and it would be easy to pretend otherwise. What the research on this patch actually lists is worktop replacement, worktop templating and worktop installation. 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. 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. So the nesting is planned around it rather than around a standard kitchen. Proven on the bench before dispatch. A new extension slab is not automatically level, and that wants checking before templating rather than after the stone is cut. Cutting several kitchens from different slabs and calling them matched is where firms get caught out. Nested for the job in front of us.

A peninsula is an island with one end tied to a run, which means the join between them has to be planned rather than allowed to happen. The nest is laid out around that, with joins placed over cabinet gables and kept clear of every cut-out. The bench proves it before the van does. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

Window boards and cills stand proud of the plaster, so the back edge of the top has to be plotted to where the units actually sit rather than to the wall. Cut it square where it should be radiused and the piece will fail on the lift, not in the kitchen. The drawing decides it, not the fitter. The peninsula end detail needs deciding up front - square edge, mitred apron down the end, or a full waterfall - because a waterfall end has to be cut in sequence off the same part of the slab as the top. 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. Sink and hob are dry-fitted on the bench before dispatch, whoever supplied them. The approved drawing is the instruction.