Kitchen worktops in Penge

Yes. Dense Victorian terraces with narrow rear kitchens, usually a 2.6-3.2m single run in the back addition, and a lot of two-flat conversions where the ground floor kitchen opens to the garden and the upper flat's kitchen sits over it. Small footprints mean every millimetre of run counts. Without a bay the van ends up on a single yellow with a crew member watching it, which takes a pair of hands off the carry. 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. Old tops out and new stone in, both through the same gap.

Victorian terrace, Victorian villa conversion, 1960s block of flats and new-build apartments. The flat entrance door and the internal doorways are usually tighter than the communal stairs, which is the opposite of what most people assume. Alcoves either side of the breast are rarely the same width and rarely parallel, so each one is templated as its own piece with its own scribe. No stone is ever cut from a plan.

No off-street parking on most streets, a controlled parking zone, and terraces with no side access at all, so slabs come through the front door, down the hall and round a 90-degree turn into the back addition. Carrying through the house means protecting the whole route first: floor boarded, banister padded, and the front door held open on a wedge rather than by hand. The templater measures that route on the same visit, so the drawing leaves site already knowing the maximum piece. The laser records it along with everything else.

Worktop replacement, worktop templating and worktop splashbacks & upstands, in that order. Party-wall and lease conditions in a converted building set when noisy work can happen, which shapes the fitting day more than the kitchen does. Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because a cut-out in the wrong place means a new piece. Siliconed to the worktop, never grouted. That hallway turn into the rear addition is the deciding factor here, and it is why so many Penge runs are made as two pieces with a joint even when a single length would fit the wall.

Two parallel runs with a walkway between them is the most efficient shape there is on a slab, because both pieces nest as straight lengths with almost no waste. The template records every angle in that shape as it actually is rather than as the plan drew it. The drawing leaves site complete. Walls that bow along their length are the normal condition rather than the exception, and a straight-cut back edge will show a shadow gap at one end and touch at the other. Where the wall cannot be made good, setting the stone deliberately proud on a subframe with a shadow gap reads as a detail rather than a bad fit. Make the wall good first, or accept the detail. 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.

Where ownership is split across a building, the common parts belong to someone else and the carry route is negotiated rather than assumed. Full-height panels need the wall made good first, which is another trade and another timescale. Same slab run as the tops. 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.