Kitchen worktops in Whalebone

Yes. The strip between Chadwell Heath and Becontree Heath, mixing estate housing with privately built inter-war semis, so kitchen sizes vary within a couple of streets of each other. Most jobs are moderate: a new set of units in the existing footprint, a 3m run and a short return, with a peninsula only where the dining room wall has already gone. Where the drive is too short for the van the back end overhangs the footway, and a footway is a route people are using rather than spare space. 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. Two carries in one day doubles what the distance costs.

1930s semi, LCC estate house and post-war infill. Door openings and the hall were set to a generous standard, so a long piece turns in from the front without being stood on end to do it. Ex-council flats and maisonettes are built in dense concrete and blockwork, so anything that has to be fixed back, such as brackets under a peninsula or support for an end panel, goes in with proper anchors and an SDS rather than plasterboard fixings. The building has kept moving; the new template catches up.

Residential streets with a good share of dropped kerbs, but Whalebone Lane itself is a heavily used north-south route where stopping a van is not practical. The tail lift is still the pinch point, because the piece has to be walked off it onto the trolley while it is sitting at chest height. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. Suction pads go on once the face is clean and dry, not before.

Worktop replacement and worktop installation, in that order. The person choosing the worktop is not the person using it, and that shifts the balance from appearance towards running cost. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. Handover day is a hard stop. Because the stock alternates between private and estate-built houses on the same street, we always measure rather than working from a house type.

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 existing layout is being kept, so the question is whether the old carcasses will take stone in that shape without more support. Appliance gaps are checked against the new thickness. A scribe has a working limit, and past twenty millimetres or so the back edge starts eating depth the run cannot spare. Rushing that is what leaves a gap you look at every morning for fifteen years. Offered up twice, bonded once. Supply-only material opens at £110 per square metre, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted line by line rather than as a single number.

Access is arranged through a managing agent or a scheme office rather than with the household directly, so a date gets confirmed once in writing and moving it costs a fortnight. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. A void between tenancies has no spare days in it. Say what the building is at the booking stage and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice become part of the plan rather than a surprise.

Chips at an edge or a corner are the usual form, because that is where stone is least supported. Damage found on the bench never leaves the workshop, and damage on the carry is remade under the same cover. Most breakages happen on the carry, which is why the route is walked and measured before anything comes off the van. Suction lifters need a clean dry face to hold, so in the wet the pads come off and the piece goes back to being carried on webbing by hand. Finding it out on the morning costs the whole slot, because there is no second route to fall back on. Nothing is carried past an obstruction that could have been moved.

Quartz carries resin, so a hot pan wants a trivet, while granite and sintered stone will take one without complaint. Bleach and limescale remover harm a polished finish rather than clean it, whichever material is on the units. Upkeep is settled when the slab is chosen, since it belongs to the material rather than the fabrication. An ex-council house is solidly built to a standard plan, with the kitchen at the rear and a back door next to it. The plaster is bonded straight onto the concrete, so the bottom course of tiles tends to bring plaster with it when the old top comes off, leaving a rough band behind the upstand. What is behind the old splashback decides the new one.

The fit follows 5 to 10 working days after the template, and nothing is cut before that visit because nothing is cut from a plan. Nothing is payable in advance of the template. The design and quotation visit comes first. It is free and carries no obligation. Walls and ceilings carry decades of thick emulsion over artex, and neither surface tells you where the true line is. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the job is a day, and what makes it a difficult day is the building. The old cut-outs rarely match where the new appliances go.

If the sink or hob changes after the template, the drawing changes first and nothing is cut meanwhile. Where the hob lands is set out against the units and the wall behind, not off the kitchen plan. The tap hole is drilled in the workshop too, and its position depends on how far the tap has to swing. The free end is what needs deciding early: square edge, mitred apron down the end, or a full waterfall to the floor, and a waterfall is cut in sequence off the same part of the slab. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. The island top is the one that may want its own slab.