Kitchen worktops in Sutton

Yes. Around the High Street it is mostly flats and small terraces, with kitchens of 2.4-3m in a rear addition or a corner of an open-plan living space. New blocks come with integrated appliances already fitted and only the tops replaced or upgraded on handover. A red route means no stopping, and no stopping means exactly that, so the stone comes in from a side street or from a bay behind the property. 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. It is a full day at the kerb, not a delivery.

Victorian terrace, Edwardian terrace, 1960s block and new-build apartments. Cottage terraces have no hall to speak of and the front door opens almost straight into the room, which makes the carry easier and the protection harder. In most Victorian terraces the kitchen sits in the back addition, so you get a narrow galley with one outside wall and nothing square to work off. What is under the old top is the real question.

Pedestrianised High Street with strict vehicle access hours, controlled parking on the surrounding streets, and apartment blocks with booked lifts and loading bays. The lift has to be booked and blanketed before anything moves, and that booking needs to cover the old tops coming out as well as the new stone going in. 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 templating and worktop splashbacks & upstands, in that order. Handover-spec kitchens are square, plumb and predictable, which means the join count is honest and driven by run length rather than by the building. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. A day, not a project. The pedestrian zone hours dictate everything here, so town-centre fits get booked for early morning and the van has to be clear before the restriction starts.

A galley puts the sink on one side and the hob on the other, which spreads the cut-outs across two pieces instead of weakening one. The same shape decides where splashback pieces break, and a joint in a corner reads as a detail while one in a clear run reads as a mistake. Corners get their own pieces. 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. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. The laminate has been covering it up. 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. If the carcasses are tired the honest answer is that stone will find that out, and it is better said before than after. Sound carcasses are the condition. 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.