Kitchen worktops in Worcester Park

Yes. Family suburban stock with a strong extension culture, so most kitchens here have already been pushed out to the rear and the job is a well-planned kitchen-diner with a 2m island, a run of tall units and a separate utility. Newer apartment schemes near the station have compact peninsula kitchens. A front drive is the best thing that can happen to a fitting day, because the tail lift comes down within a few metres of the door and nothing is on a clock. 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.

1930s semi, 1930s detached, post-war detached and 2000s apartment development. The chimney breast in the corner has usually been left in place, so the run gains a return and two scribed ends. Access is usually the easy part here, as most of these have a side gate and a back door straight into the kitchen, so we carry down the side alley rather than through the house and keep the mess outside. The slow parts are slow for a reason.

Residential roads with driveways and side gates, so access is good, but the station approach and the roads around the parade are congested at school and commuter times. The side passage is the measurement that matters, because a piece has to be carried flat down it and then turned in at the back door, and the turn is always tighter than the passage. The fitting day is planned backwards from that point, before anything comes off the van. That is what the morning is planned around.

Worktop design & quotation, worktop installation and worktop templating, in that order. 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. Two to three hours on site, with the sink, tap and hob physically present. Units fitted, fixed and level first. There are a lot of hob-and-extractor combinations here that need a downdraft cut-out in the worktop, which changes the island layout and has to be agreed with the appliance spec before templating.

An island is a single visible piece with four finished edges and no wall to hide against, so it is the piece the whole kitchen is judged on. On the day that means dry-laying the whole layout first and only then pulling and bonding the joins. The join is the last thing finished. Boxing is rarely the same depth at worktop height as it is at floor level, so measuring it low down is the usual reason a top will not sit back. This is the item most often left out of a cheaper quote, and it comes back as a variation once the templater has been. Priced as fabrication, not as area. 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.

Where someone is living in the house through the work, the strip-out and the fit are planned so the kitchen is out of use for a day and not a week. A template booked hopefully around another trade is the commonest cause of a wasted visit. Appliances on site, not on order. 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.