Kitchen worktops in Herne Hill

Yes. Family houses on the Dulwich side take substantial rear or side-return extensions producing kitchens of 4m or more in width, with a long run, a full island and often a separate pantry cupboard with its own stone shelf. Conversion flats in the villas have kitchens fitted into former reception rooms with tall ceilings and a peninsula. Permit hours are what matters, not the permit itself, because a bay that frees up at six in the evening is no use for a template at ten. We aim for the first slot of the day where parking is tight, because that is when the street is emptiest. We would rather ask than guess.

Victorian villa, Edwardian terrace, Large semi-detached and Conversion flat. Original joinery is deep and stands proud of the plaster, so the run is plotted to the units rather than to the wall behind them. If the island top is a few hundred millimetres longer than the usable length of a slab, you buy a second slab to gain that overhang — the whole slab, not the part you use — and that is a material decision worth more than any other line on the quote. That is what the itemised lines are for.

The streets have front gardens and gate posts that narrow the approach, and permit parking is enforced. The area floods for events at the park and the railway bridge by the station is a bottleneck for anything arriving from the north. Door width, hall width and the diagonal at the turn are three separate measurements, and it is the diagonal that catches people out. We price the carry from what you tell us about the route, so photographs of the approach are worth more to us than a floor plan. You see that figure before we template, not after.

Worktop design & quotation, worktop templating and worktop installation, in that order. In a converted house the flat entrance and the internal doorway are usually tighter than the communal stairs, and that is easy to overlook. Comparing quotes only works when they itemise the same things, and this is where the differences usually hide. Material is the slab only, and it says so. These are big rooms with big islands, so the carry through the hall and out to the rear is the deciding factor — measure the narrowest point on that route before agreeing a single-piece island.

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. Nothing is bonded until the whole run sits flat. The returns into a breast recess are the tightest scribes in the room, and they are eased in rather than forced. It is recorded on the drawing with the run dimensions so the workshop is not guessing. That is why the visit takes two or three hours. 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. Material is quoted as a supply range and the labour lines separately, because an installed rate per square metre is not a real number. Every line has a reason next to it. 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.