Kitchen worktops in Hanworth

Yes. Modest kitchens in postwar semis, typically a U-shape with the back door in one corner so the run is broken by doorways, and the boiler still sitting on the kitchen wall. 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. 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. The waste run is planned, not improvised.

1930s semi, postwar estate house, Butts Farm estate and cottage stock near the park. Original quarry-tiled floors sit lower than a later screed, so a run crossing that junction needs the units packed to one level. The ragged band left when old tiles and laminate come off together is what usually decides upstand over full height. The wall makes that decision, not the brochure.

Quiet residential estates with generous driveways and grass verges and no parking restrictions worth mentioning. The narrow cul-de-sac turning heads are the only issue. 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. Where the route is tight we break a long splashback at a natural vertical joint instead of forcing one panel through. It decides panel size before anything is cut.

Worktop replacement, worktop installation and worktop splashbacks & upstands, in that order. A new extension slab is not automatically level, and that wants checking before templating rather than after the stone is cut. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. A plumber either side of us. That back-door-in-the-corner layout means most tops end in a cut return under 600mm, so you make a lot of small pieces rather than one long one.

A U shape uses more linear metres than people expect, and the two returns rarely nest together, so a second slab is a genuine possibility. Long runs almost never take a single panel, so the joint positions want agreeing before anything is templated. The joint to the worktop is siliconed, never grouted. A notch around a boxed stack is machined with a radius at the internal corner, because a square inside corner there is exactly where a top will crack. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. Found at template, not on fit day. 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.

Owner-occupied kitchens are usually being done once, which is why the edge profile, the vein direction and where a join falls are worth the conversation. A replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. Units kept, surface changed. 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.