Worktop design and quotation in Belgravia

Yes. Belgravia is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are SW1W, SW1X. It is run from the Watford side, covering Hertfordshire & North London. On a street with no restrictions the constraint is other residents rather than a warden, so it is worth putting a cone or a car out early. Tell us at enquiry stage and it is priced properly, because a crew stood waiting is the most expensive thing on any job. Nothing here is added after the fact. We template in your kitchen and fit in your kitchen, so there is nothing to visit and nothing to collect.

Rooms are tall with deep window reveals, and a run finishing into a reveal is templated to it rather than assumed square. The second thing is the carry route: front door, narrow hall, a turn at the stairs and often a step down into the extension, which can mean a piece that would template in one length has to be split to physically get into the room. Priced from the building, not from a rate card. Basement kitchens here run long and thin, so the slab has to be brought in on edge down a stair with limited headroom - measure the stair soffit, that is what limits piece length, not the room.

Listed status and estate landlord consent govern everything, works hours are policed by the managing agent and neighbours, skips are effectively banned so waste goes out by hand, and slabs come down an external area stair or through the front door and down a stone flight with a tight turn at the bottom. Stone goes up on edge, and it is the half-landing turn rather than the flight itself that sets the maximum piece. That is why the fitting line on a quote reflects manpower and time rather than square metres. Nothing about it gets estimated after the fact. Tell us what the approach looks like when you book the template and it gets built into the day rather than discovered on it.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop templating and worktop installation. A worktop replacement between tenancies is a single-day job by design, because the flat is not earning while it is empty. Comparing quotes only works when they itemise the same things, and this is where the differences usually hide. Itemised, so it can be compared honestly. Where kitchens turn over between tenancies the priority is a surface that survives a decade of being treated as a chopping board. That changes what the quote should be compared against, because the shape of the job is not the same as a single family kitchen. Itemised, so it can be compared honestly.

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. It is the shape rather than the square metreage that moves the number, which is why two kitchens the same size quote differently. Shape first, area second. Material is £110-£550 per square metre supply only, and templating, fabrication and fitting are quoted on their own lines.

Legs bottoming out on hard concrete or an uneven screed mean the tops of the carcasses are not one plane, and that is picked up at template rather than on fitting day. Send photographs of every corner of the room and it gets priced properly first time. Photographs are worth more than a plan here. Send us the run lengths, plus photos taken walking from the pavement through the hall to the kitchen so we can see the door widths and the stair turn. Quartz is the sensible default in a rental: nothing to seal, nothing to maintain, and nothing an incoming tenant needs briefing on. The quote is written so it can be read by whoever is paying rather than only by whoever is standing in the kitchen. Every line has a reason next to it.