What a kitchen fit includes
Every fit starts with the old kitchen out and the room bare. That’s when the walls and floor show their real state, and the cheapest time to put them right.
- Strip-out of the old kitchen
- Base units set level from the highest point of the floor
- Wall units hung on fixings that suit the wall: stone, brick, block or plasterboard
- Worktops cut, jointed and scribed to the walls
- Integrated appliances fitted, with doors and drawer fronts lined up
- End panels, plinths, cornice and pelmet cut to the room
- Splashback and wall tiling, done by us rather than a separate tiler
Walls that aren’t straight
Very few kitchen walls in Dumfries are flat or square. In the red sandstone houses around Maxwelltown and the town centre, a wall can wander 15 or 20mm over the length of a worktop. The shortcut is a fat bead of silicone along the gap. We scribe instead: worktops and end panels are marked off the wall and cut to follow it, so the joint stays tight all the way along.
Base units are set from the highest point of the floor and everything is brought up to it, so the worktop is level even where the floor isn’t.
Worktops
Laminate is cut and joined on site, with the joints bolted and sealed so water can’t reach the chipboard core and swell it. Solid wood is oiled on every face before it goes down, including the underside and the edges of the sink cut-out. Skip that and an oak top can cup inside a winter. For quartz or granite, the stone company templates once our units are in and fits its own tops.
Check the delivery
When your kitchen is delivered, open the boxes straight away and check for damaged doors and missing panels. A chipped door found on delivery day is a phone call to the supplier. Found on day three of the fit, it holds up the whole job.
Plumbing, gas and electrics
Moving a sink, hob or sockets means plumbing and electrical work as well. Any gas work, including disconnecting or reconnecting a gas hob, has to be done by a Gas Safe registered engineer.
Recent work
Common questions
Can we use the kitchen while you’re fitting it?
Not for most of the job. Set up a kettle and microwave in another room. Before we start, we’ll tell you which days the sink will be out of action.
Can you replace just the doors and worktops?
Often, if the carcasses are sound and level. We look at the units first. New doors aren’t worth hanging on carcasses that have swollen at the base from a slow leak under the sink.
