Kitchen worktops in North Acton

Yes. Almost entirely new-build and student-scheme apartments with compact runs of 1.8m to 2.6m, everything integrated, no islands, and the client is usually an operator rather than a homeowner. Where the bay sits some distance from the core, the carry across the car park is the longest leg of the day and gets boarded and lit. 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.

2010s-2020s high-rise, purpose-built student block, build-to-rent tower and light industrial fringe. Kitchens are compact and standardised, which makes the fixed template, fabrication and fitting lines a larger share of the total than the stone. Plaster bonded straight onto concrete comes away with the bottom course of tiles, leaving a band behind the upstand. What is under the old top is the real question.

Tower blocks with booked service lifts, time-limited loading bays and security sign-in. Delivery comes off Victoria Road and the A40 without much difficulty. A car that takes 2.4m on the diagonal will not take a three-metre worktop however it is stood, and there is no trimming it on the landing. We plan the strip-out and the carry as one movement so the kitchen is only out of use for a single day. That is agreed before a plumber is booked.

Worktop replacement, worktop fabrication and worktop installation, in that order. Quartz suits let property well: no sealing, no annual maintenance, and nothing an incoming tenant has to be told to look after. One visit, with the sink and hob seated and sealed before we leave. Sealed before we leave. In these towers the service lift car dimension sets the maximum piece size before the layout or the slab does, so measure the lift first.

If the island is a few hundred millimetres longer than the usable length of a slab, a second slab gets bought to gain that overhang, and the whole slab is paid for rather than the part used. Pieces are dry-assembled on the bench before dispatch so the corners are known to close before they leave the workshop. The bench proves it before the van does. 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. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. It is the usual surprise, and it is a known one. 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.

A street with houses in single occupation next to the same houses cut into flats produces two completely different jobs from the same elevation. A half-day of access is not a fitting day, and it is better to say so at booking than to find out at eleven. One visit, our own installers. 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.