Kitchen renovation guide: the order of work that keeps a project on track

Before any layout is drawn, write down how the room is used. Who cooks, how often, whether two people are in there at once, where shopping lands, where bins go, whether the room doubles as homework space. A layout that suits a household that eats out five nights a week is a poor layout for one that bakes at the weekend.

This sounds obvious, but most kitchen regrets are layout regrets, not finish regrets. Nobody complains about a handle. They complain that the dishwasher door blocks the oven, or that the only worktop run is on the far side of the room from the hob.

A proper survey records wall deviation, floor level, ceiling height at several points, window reveals, existing service positions, joist direction and access route. In Victorian and Edwardian London stock, almost nothing is square, and a twenty-five millimetre fall across a five-metre run is common.

Those measurements drive real decisions: whether a tall run will actually stand up under a sloping ceiling, whether an island can be serviced without lifting a whole floor, whether the worktop can arrive in one piece up the stairs.

Once cabinetry is cut, changes are expensive. Appliance models must be confirmed, because integrated units vary in width, hinge side and required clearances. Sink and tap choices affect worktop cut-outs. Extraction affects ceiling and cabinet design.

Sign off drawings that show elevations, not just a plan. Elevations are where you notice that the wall cabinet lands awkwardly against the window architrave, or that the plinth detail fights the existing skirting.

Getting the sequence wrong is what causes delay and rework. The order below works for most refits and should be agreed with everyone before the first tool arrives.

For a straightforward replacement in an existing layout, expect three to five weeks on site. Add structural work or a relocated kitchen and it becomes eight to twelve weeks. Bespoke cabinetry is made while site work proceeds, so the lead time usually overlaps rather than adds - provided the design was signed off early.

The two dates that matter are the drawing sign-off date and the worktop template date. Slip either and everything downstream moves, because stone fabrication and appliance deliveries are booked slots, not flexible ones.

Set up a temporary kitchen somewhere else in the house with a kettle, microwave, fridge and a sink you can reach. Agree working hours, dust protection, where waste will be stored and which route through the house the trades will use. In flats, check the building's rules on working hours, lift protection and skip permits before you start.

Agree in writing who is coordinating. On smaller projects that is often the homeowner, and that is fine, as long as everyone knows it and someone is answering the questions that arise daily on site.

Walk the room in daylight with the drawings in hand. Check that doors and drawers align and close evenly, that scribes are tight, that the worktop has no rough arrises, that appliance doors clear handles, that sockets are where they were specified and that lighting is switched as agreed.

Expect a small snag list; every project has one. What matters is that it is written down, dated, agreed and cleared in one visit rather than dribbling out over months.

Choosing appliances after cabinetry, ordering stone before cabinets are level, running the extraction as an afterthought, forgetting a socket for the thing you use every morning, and specifying an island too narrow to walk around with an oven door open. All of these are cheap to solve on paper and expensive to solve on site.

The last one is worth a tape measure moment: a comfortable circulation gap either side of an island is around one metre, and 1.2 metres if two people work in the space at once.