We are not going to publish an installed price per square metre, because it is not a real number. Two kitchens with identical areas can differ by a factor that has nothing to do with the stone. What we can do is show you every input that moves the figure, so you can read your own quote and challenge anyone else’s.
The one number we will publish
Material across our range runs from £110/m² supply to around £550/m² supply. That is the slab, supply only. It does not include fabrication, cut-outs, edge work, delivery or installation, and it is the only per-metre figure on this site for exactly that reason.
Anyone quoting a single all-in per-metre rate for a finished kitchen is either averaging across jobs that are not like yours, or leaving items out to be added later. Ask them which cut-outs are included at that rate and watch what happens.
1. Area, and how your kitchen falls onto a slab
Square metreage is the obvious driver, but slab yield is the one that surprises people. Slabs come in fixed sizes (typically around 3.2m by 1.6m, varying by brand and batch), and what matters is how efficiently your runs cut out of them.
A kitchen with 5m² spread across three short runs may cut from a single slab with room to spare. A kitchen with the same 5m² but one continuous 3.4m run cannot, because that run does not fit, which means either a join or a second slab. You pay for the slab, not for the area you use out of it, and that is why an extra 200mm on one run can move a quote more than an extra square metre spread across three.
This is also why book-matched or heavily veined materials cost more to fabricate: matching a pattern across pieces means cutting in sequence and accepting more offcut. Worth asking about if you have picked a dramatic marble-look.
2. The material band
The colour you choose sets the band. Entry-level plain quartz and common granites sit at the bottom; heavily veined premium quartz, rare granites and large-format sintered slabs sit at the top. The bands overlap across families. There are granites cheaper than mid-range quartz, and sintered surfaces cheaper than premium quartz.
Within a band, the difference is almost always pattern rather than performance. In a domestic kitchen, a mid-range white quartz and a premium one behave identically; you are paying for the veining. We will tell you when that is the case. It costs us margin and it is the fastest way to take money off a quote without regretting it later.
3. Cut-outs
Each opening in the stone is machine time plus hand finishing, and each is priced separately. The list is longer than people expect: sink, hob, tap, second tap or boiling-water tap, soap dispenser, pop-up sockets, downdraught extractor, drainer grooves.
- An undermounted sink costs more than an inset one: the exposed edge of the cut-out has to be polished to the same finish as the top
- A Belfast sink changes the whole detail and must be installed before we template
- A downdraught extractor cuts through the top and needs careful support around the opening
- Drainer grooves are milled after the cut-out and are a separate item
- Cut-outs near an edge or a join need extra care and sometimes extra support
This is the single most common place where two quotes for the same kitchen diverge. If cut-outs are not listed individually on a quote, you cannot tell whether they are in the price or not.
4. Edge work
Edge is priced by the linear metre and by profile, and the range is wide. A pencil round on a 20mm top is quick. A 60mm mitred apron along a full run and around an island is a different job: extra slab, precise 45-degree cutting, gluing, clamping and polishing the joint out so it disappears.
A waterfall end is the most expensive edge detail in a domestic kitchen, because the stone has to be cut in sequence so the pattern carries around the corner, then dry-assembled in the workshop before it goes anywhere near your house. If you have specified one, expect it to be a visible line on the quote.
5. Joins
Every join is labour: cutting both faces true, glueing, colour-matching, levelling and polishing out on site. A visible join is typically 2–3mm when it is done properly.
The number of joins is not entirely a choice. It is set by slab size, by the length of your runs, and by access: a 3m piece of stone has to physically get from the van into your kitchen, and a first-floor flat with a tight staircase may force a join that a ground-floor kitchen would not need. What is a choice is where they fall, and that gets agreed with you at the template visit rather than decided by whoever is cutting.
6. Access and site conditions
Stone is heavy and it does not bend. Everything about getting it into your kitchen affects the labour on the day: parking, distance from the van, stairs, lifts, tight turns on a landing, a narrow side return, a first-floor flat with no lift.
- How many people are needed to carry each piece in safely
- Whether pieces have to be sized down to get through the route, adding joins
- Removing and disposing of an old worktop, if it is a replacement job
- Whether the existing units will take the weight, or need strengthening first
- Steel support let into the cabinetry for an unsupported overhang
None of this is exotic. It is just the difference between a job that takes two people six hours and one that takes three people a day, and it is why we ask about access before quoting rather than discovering it on installation morning.
How to compare two quotes honestly
- 1
Put them side by side line for line
Area, material and band, each cut-out, each edge run with its profile, each join, upstands or splashback, delivery, installation, and removal of the old tops. If one quote has fewer lines, it is not cheaper: it is less specific.
- 2
Check the material is genuinely the same
Same brand, same colour, same thickness, same finish. A polished and a matt version of the same colour are not the same price, and a look-alike from another range is not the same slab.
- 3
Ask what happens after templating
Specifically: if the template shows something the plan did not, what is the process? A company that says the price is fixed against the drawing and changes get priced and approved first is telling you how they behave when it goes wrong.
- 4
Ask who is doing each stage
Templating, fabrication and fitting. If they sit with three different companies, the cheapest quote can end up the most expensive one to put right.
- 5
Read the guarantee, including the exclusions
Headline years are marketing. What is excluded, and which parts of the UK it applies to, is the actual product.
Where to save money without regretting it
- Drop a band on the material where the difference is pattern rather than performance. Ask us where that applies to your shortlist
- Simplify the edge. A pencil round on a 20mm top instead of a 60mm mitre is a big number on a large kitchen
- Lose cut-outs you will not miss: a second tap hole, drainer grooves, pop-up sockets
- Use upstands rather than a full-height splashback, or tile the splashback instead
- Keep runs within slab lengths where the design allows, so you are not paying for a second slab to gain 200mm
And where not to
Do not save money by having the fitting done by someone other than the fabricator, and do not accept a quote with no itemisation because the total looks good. Both are how kitchens end up with joins in the wrong place and nobody to ring.
What we will do
Send plans, a sketch or a few photos with rough measurements and we come back with an indicative range the same day, enough to tell you whether you are in the right ballpark, before anyone visits. Once the design is settled you get a fixed written quote with every cut-out, edge profile, upstand and join itemised. The number you approve is the number you pay, and any change that comes out of the template is priced and agreed with you before anything is cut.
The short version
- Material is £110–£550/m² supply only: no all-in per-metre figure is a real number
- Slab yield can move a price more than area does; one long run may force a second slab
- Cut-outs and edge work are where two quotes for the same kitchen usually diverge
- Access and site conditions are a genuine cost, not an excuse
- Compare quotes line for line, and read the guarantee exclusions before the headline