Worktop installation in Woodford Green

Yes. Woodford Green is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are IG8. It is worked on our east London run, along with the rest of Redbridge. Gravel and block paving both look like hard standing and neither takes a loaded trolley, so the run from tail lift to door gets boarded. We aim for the first slot of the day where parking is tight, because that is when the street is emptiest. It is why the arrival time is what it is. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

These kitchens are big rooms with long perimeter runs and an island, so level has to hold across the whole floor rather than along one wall. Access through the property is usually the simplest of any archetype, with wide doors and generous rooms, so we can often carry a full-length piece straight in without a planned join. Walked, measured, protected, then lifted. The islands here are frequently over 3m and porcelain that size wants proper handling, we plan lifting equipment and a full team rather than muscling it in.

Wide roads, deep front drives, gated entrances and side access to the rear on most plots, so we can usually get lifting gear or a trolley right to the doorway. Where the van stands level with the front of the house a piece gets handled twice instead of five times, and stone breaks on handling rather than on the road. Finding it out on the morning costs the whole slot, because there is no second route to fall back on. It gets checked before the first piece is lifted.

It is one of the three we do most here, behind worktop design & quotation. Same template visit, same workshop, same installers either way. 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. One visit, with the sink and hob seated and sealed before we leave. One visit, done properly. Rear and side-return extensions are where the islands appear, and an island is the piece that decides whether one slab does the kitchen or two. The fitting day is scheduled to suit that rather than to suit the diary. The prep list is not optional.

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. Joins are pulled with suction clamps and finished flush, then colour-matched, which is the last thing done rather than the first. The join is the last thing finished. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

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. The back edge is eased in progressively rather than offered up once and forced. Eased in, never forced. Give us the hardest, shortest approach to the door you can, clear of parked cars, and warn us of any soft ground, steps or gravel on the route. The householder is normally on site at template, and that is the right time to settle sink position, tap centres and overhang rather than agree them by email. The fitting day is arranged with whoever can actually give us access for the whole slot. Protection goes down first.