Worktop installation in West Brompton

Yes. West Brompton is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SW5, SW10. It is worked on our west London run, along with the rest of Kensington and Chelsea. Some zones are controlled for a short window in the middle of the day and open either side of it, which makes the timing of the visit the whole question. 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. We would rather ask than guess. Everything that involves you happens in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

The outrigger shares a party wall with the addition next door for its whole length, so one long side of the kitchen is solid brick with another kitchen on the far side of it. The day is planned backwards from the hall. Movement joints in the shell stay movement joints. A notch around a boxed stack is machined with a radius at the internal corner, because a square inside corner there is exactly where a top will crack. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. Fixings find the studs or they find nothing.

A goods lift booked by the hour puts a clock on the whole delivery, so pieces go up in a planned order and nothing is handled twice. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. Protection goes down along it first. A suspension only works if the cones and the notice are actually there on the morning, and now and then a car is sitting in the bay regardless. 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 kerb decides the start time.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop replacement. 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. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Handover day is a hard stop. Extension work runs late far more often than it runs early, and the worktop is close to the last thing in, so the date agreed at the start is rarely the date that happens. One visit, with the sink and hob seated and sealed before we leave. The annexe and the main kitchen go in together.

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. 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. Stone is £110 to £550 per square metre supply only, and the templating, the fabrication and the fitting each carry their own line.

A live soil stack cannot be chased back into the wall, so the depth it steals is permanent and the run is planned around it rather than through it. Rushing that is what leaves a gap you look at every morning for fifteen years. A bonded mitre goes down on one plane or not at all. 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. One owner can take a date next week while the flat below needs three weeks of notice, so several kitchens in one building end up scheduled by the slowest permission. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. One visit where permission only stretches to one.

Dark and heavily veined stone shows a join more than a pale even one, which is worth knowing before the slab is picked. There are only ever a few legal positions, and the one taken is furthest from the light. Join count is a question about slab size and run length, nothing else. It is the heaviest single piece in the kitchen, so the number of hands needed on the day and the route in are worked out from that piece rather than from the runs. 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.

What comes out goes by the same route the new stone comes in by, which is why that route is walked before anything is lifted. Taking the old tops off and disposing of them is its own line on the quote rather than something folded into the stone price. The carcasses stay. Only the surface changes. Where the permit is a digital session rather than a paper one, somebody in the house has to start it at the hour the van actually arrives. We aim for the first slot of the day where parking is tight, because that is when the street is emptiest. Van to door is the distance that matters.

Topping a seal up is a wipe-on job with a cloth. Bleach and limescale remover harm a polished finish rather than clean it, whichever material is on the units. Where a top takes wine, oil and lemon most days, the non-porous materials ask least of the household. A soil stack is strapped to the outside of the addition wall and its branch comes through low, which settles where the sink can go before any layout is drawn. 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. A structure this old is worked with, not corrected.

A join added to get stone into the room is a different thing from a join added because the slab ran out, and the quote says which is which. An external stair, a side return or a rear garden counts as carry and is measured the same way. 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. We walk the route with a tape and protect it end to end before the first piece is lifted. Every piece is staged to it before fitting starts.