Kitchen worktops in West Barnes

Yes. Attached garages are the local feature, and a lot of kitchens here have grown sideways into the old garage rather than backwards into the garden, giving a long single-wall run of 4m or more plus a utility at the far end. Straight-line layouts with no island are the norm. 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. Pieces are loaded in reverse fitting order so the first thing off the van is the first thing that goes down. The load plan follows from it.

1930s semi, Interwar detached and 1960s cul-de-sac house. Solid brick with a render coat is firm to work against and out of plumb, so the scribe at worktop height is different from the one at plinth level. Access is usually the easy part here, as most of these have a side gate and a back door straight into the kitchen, so we carry down the side alley rather than through the house and keep the mess outside. Walked, measured, protected, then lifted.

The cul-de-sac layouts have tight turning heads that a long wheelbase van struggles with, so the last stretch is often a hand carry from the mouth of the close. Once there, most properties have off-street parking and a level drive. 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. We walk the route with a tape and protect it end to end before the first piece is lifted. It gets checked before the first piece is lifted.

Worktop installation, worktop fabrication and worktop templating, in that order. A kitchen carved out of a larger room sits under whatever the original plan left behind, so the run frequently ends at a blocked doorway or a boxed-in service. One visit, with the sink and hob seated and sealed before we leave. One visit, done properly. Garage-conversion kitchens run longer than a single slab, so plan a joint deliberately at a sink or hob position rather than letting it land mid-run.

Galley runs are usually short enough to come out of a single slab, so the material band you choose does more to the total than the room shape does. The template records every angle in that shape as it actually is rather than as the plan drew it. One datum for the whole room. A chimney breast left in place splits a wall into two alcoves, and the two are rarely the same width and rarely parallel to each other. It is recorded on the drawing with the run dimensions so the workshop is not guessing. Plotted, not estimated. 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 someone is living in the house through the work, the strip-out and the fit are planned so the kitchen is out of use for a day and not a week. Floors and units are protected before anything comes through the door, communal or otherwise. 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.