Kitchen worktops in Wimbledon Park

Yes. The terraces on the streets sloping down to the lake are the classic side-return job: the alley is filled in, the kitchen widens to about 3.6m and takes a long run under a rooflight with a modest island opposite. Where houses are split into upper and lower conversions, the top flat usually keeps a narrow galley in the old back bedroom. Without a bay the van ends up on a single yellow with a crew member watching it, which takes a pair of hands off the carry. 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. Old tops out and new stone in, both through the same gap.

Edwardian terrace, Victorian terrace and Purpose-built 1930s flat. Where the side return has been filled in, the old external wall is now an internal one and still carries its render, its gutter line and its old fixings. 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. That is the shape of the day.

Permit-holder bays fill up from mid-morning and the streets are narrow enough that a parked van blocks a lane. Upper conversion flats are reached by a straight but tight internal stair with a half-landing turn, so long lengths have to be measured against the stairwell diagonal before ordering. Stone goes up on edge, and it is the half-landing turn rather than the flight itself that sets the maximum piece. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. That is what the morning is planned around.

Worktop templating, worktop installation and worktop replacement, in that order. A kitchen carved out of a larger room sits under whatever the original plan left behind, so the run frequently ends at a blocked doorway or a boxed-in service. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. A day, not a project. Extension floors here are often laid before the units go in and settle unevenly, so the base cabinets need packing and re-levelling on template day or the joint on a long run opens up.

A galley puts the sink on one side and the hob on the other, which spreads the cut-outs across two pieces instead of weakening one. The template records every angle in that shape as it actually is rather than as the plan drew it. One datum for the whole room. 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. On the day it means dry-laying, marking, and cutting the scribe on site before anything is bonded. Dry-lay, mark, cut, then bond. Material runs from £110 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines rather than rolled into one figure.

A street with houses in single occupation next to the same houses cut into flats produces two completely different jobs from the same elevation. A half-day of access is not a fitting day, and it is better to say so at booking than to find out at eleven. Access for the whole slot, or a different day. Tell us the building when you book and the lift, the stair turn and any freeholder notice get built into the day rather than found on it.