Skip to content

City of London · EC4Y

Worktop templating in Temple

A digital template plotting the room as it really is, taken once your units are fitted, fixed and level.

  • 5.0from 23 Google reviews
  • 25-year material · 5-year workmanship
  • Fitted 3-7 working days from template

Temple kitchens

What the kitchens here are actually like

Inn of Court chambers building with residential setslisted brick range around a courtpostwar rebuild in period stylesmall flat within a legal building

Lath and plaster, a settled floor and a hall with a turn in it are the three things that decide how this job runs. The template records what the building actually did, not what the plan intended, and the gap between those two is what this visit is for. Sink, tap and hob on site, not on order.

Residential sets within the Inns have small kitchens fitted into rooms that were never designed for them, typically a 1.8-2.6m run against a chimney breast or under a sash window, with wiring and plumbing surface-run in trunking. Everything is a careful retrofit rather than a design exercise, and stone is chosen for a hard-wearing surface in a heritage room rather than for a statement island.

The Temple is a private, gated precinct with controlled vehicle entry, porters and its own rules, so access has to be arranged through the Inn's estates office rather than turned up to. Internally it is cobbles and setts in the courts, narrow historic stairs with worn stone treads, and listed joinery you cannot unhang. Worn stone stair treads are slippery and uneven, and a two-man carry on those with a slab on edge is where people get hurt - use a proper frame and take the extra body.

Edwardian terraces are wider and taller than the Victorian houses next to them, so the kitchen usually takes a full-width rear room rather than a narrow outrigger. Victorian party walls and chimney-breast returns bow along their length, so the template plots the real line rather than assuming a straight one - the template picks up points every few hundred millimetres down the back of the run and the drawing carries that curve through to the saw. Recorded as it is, not as it was drawn.

The buildings themselves are mostly Inn of Court chambers building with residential sets, listed brick range around a court, postwar rebuild in period style and small flat within a legal building. Which of those you have decides most of what follows.

True everywhere

Worktop templating, in short

  • Two to three hours on site for a typical kitchen.
  • Units must be fitted, fixed and level first. No stone is ever cut from a plan.
  • Sink, tap and hob must be physically on site, not just ordered.
  • A Belfast or butler sink must be installed and at its final height.

Covered on our the City run. Fitted 3–7 working days from template.

Victorian and Edwardian terraces

What gets asked for here

Second or third on the list around here, after worktop replacement. Same visit, same bench, same crew, same lead time.

Victorian and Edwardian terraces

Getting stone into the room

Sign-in at the gate, a permit on the dash and a named contact are usually wanted before anything comes off the van. Door widths, turn diagonals and any change of level are recorded on the drawing alongside the run dimensions. That is part of what the visit is for.

Access

Getting stone into a Temple kitchen

The Temple is a private, gated precinct with controlled vehicle entry, porters and its own rules, so access has to be arranged through the Inn's estates office rather than turned up to. Internally it is cobbles and setts in the courts, narrow historic stairs with worn stone treads, and listed joinery you cannot unhang.

Tell us what the approach looks like when you book the template and it gets built into the day rather than discovered on it. Where the route is genuinely tight, it changes how the pieces are cut, which is a fabrication decision rather than a delivery one.

3–7 working days

From template to fitted, working days from template. The same on this patch as every other.

the City patch

Temple is covered on our the City run, along with the rest of the Square Mile.

We come to you

Templated in your kitchen, cut in our workshop, fitted by our own installers.

Access told straight

If the route forces an extra join, you hear that at quote stage, not on the day.

Questions

Worktop templating in Temple

If yours is not here, ring and ask. You get a straight answer rather than a call-back from a salesperson.

Is Temple on your patch?

Yes. Temple is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are EC4Y. It is worked on our the City run, along with the rest of the Square Mile. A free-parking street with cars both sides can still leave the van forty metres away, and that distance is carry, not driving. It is noted on the job sheet at template so the fitting crew inherit the answer rather than rediscovering it. The templater needs a proper stop, not a pause. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

Why would worktop templating in Temple be any different from anywhere else?

The rear extension is frequently original rather than added, which means it is solidly built and just as far out of square as the rest of the house. Alcoves either side of the breast are rarely the same width and rarely parallel, so each one is templated as its own piece with its own scribe. Two to three hours, once the units are in. Worn stone stair treads are slippery and uneven, and a two-man carry on those with a slab on edge is where people get hurt - use a proper frame and take the extra body.

How would you get a worktop into a property in Temple?

The Temple is a private, gated precinct with controlled vehicle entry, porters and its own rules, so access has to be arranged through the Inn's estates office rather than turned up to. Internally it is cobbles and setts in the courts, narrow historic stairs with worn stone treads, and listed joinery you cannot unhang. Sign-in at the gate, a permit on the dash and a named contact are usually wanted before anything comes off the van. Door widths, turn diagonals and any change of level are recorded on the drawing alongside the run dimensions. That is part of what the visit is for.

Do you do much worktop templating around Temple?

It is one of the three we do most here, behind worktop replacement. Same template visit, same workshop, same installers either way. Where kitchens turn over between tenancies the priority is a surface that survives a decade of being treated as a chopping board. No stone is ever cut from a plan, which is inconvenient exactly when a programme is tight. Units fitted, fixed and level first. Landlord work is scheduled around void periods, so the whole thing is a fixed window and the template date matters as much as the fitting date. Two to three hours on site, with the sink, tap and hob physically present. The room as it is, not as it was drawn.

What moves the number on a quote around here?

If the island is a few hundred millimetres longer than the usable length of a slab, a second slab gets bought to gain that overhang, and the whole slab is paid for rather than the part used. A layout templated off one wall instead of one datum will not sit right once all the pieces are down together. One datum for the whole room. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

What needs to be ready before you come to Temple?

Where a breast interrupts a long wall the join can often go there, so it reads as a natural break rather than a line in the middle of a worktop. One measurement never describes it, which is why a tape reading taken before the visit rarely matches the template. Plotted, not estimated. Units fixed and packed level over the sloping floor, walls replastered and dry at their final thickness (tiling and splashbacks go on after the worktop, never before), and the sink, tap and hob physically on site, with a Belfast sink built in and set at its finished height. A street with houses in single occupation next to the same houses cut into flats produces two completely different jobs from the same elevation. The template happens when the units are in, fixed and level, whoever is fitting them. No stone is cut from a plan.

Next step

Worktop templating in Temple, priced properly

Plans, a sketch or photographs with rough run lengths is enough to start. You get an itemised written quote and the template dates we can offer on this patch.

25-year material warranty and a 5-year workmanship guarantee, both stated on your quote.

+44 7830 847489