Bespoke Joinery in Prestonpans

Before, an alcove with a bowed shelf and a stack of boxes. After, a full height run that reads as part of the wall, and the difference is a set of dimensions rather than a style.

George Herkes & Son Joinery has worked across East Lothian since 1989, holds East Lothian Trading Standards Trusted Trader accreditation and is rated 5.0 from 62 reviews, and the joiner in Prestonpans who measures the alcove is the one who builds and fits the run.

Send George the room and the sizes you have and he will come and take the rest.

Bespoke Kitchens

Before: a room where the units stop short of the wall, a filler at each end, and a chimney breast with a metre of dead space beside it. After: a run that reaches both walls, a full height pull out where the breast used to waste the space, and a worktop with its joints away from the sink.

The specification behind that is unremarkable and it is where the difference lives. Carcasses are eighteen millimetre board, dowelled with glue blocks at the corners and a solid back where the run carries worktop weight. Drawer runners are rated by width and load, so a pan drawer and a cutlery drawer of the same size take different gear. Appliance apertures are taken from the appliances rather than from nominal sizes. Worktop joints are set out away from the sink and the hob, because those are the two places a joint fails first. Where a run has to turn a corner the carcasses are levelled to each other before either is fixed, since a worktop will show a difference of two millimetres across a mitre and will not forgive it later.

Cabinetry, Furniture and Alcove Joinery for Prestonpans Homes

Before: an alcove with a bowed shelf and a stack of boxes. After: a full height run that reads as part of the wall.

Prestonpans stock is mostly two storey semi detached houses, with single storey semi detached cottages and Victorian tenement flats on New Street. All three tend to give you a chimney breast with a recess either side, and the two recesses are rarely the same depth because one side usually carries a flue. The carcasses are built to the two depths the room actually has, the face frames are made to a single line, and the difference disappears where nobody looks. Fixings follow the wall: resin anchors into stone, frame fixings into block. The same specification covers fitted wardrobes furniture in Prestonpans. In a tenement flat the wall behind an alcove is often a party wall, which changes the fixing again and is worth establishing with a detector rather than a chisel.

Doors, Windows and Staircases

Before: a door that needs a shoulder in damp weather and a stair with a balustrade that fails current spacing. After: a leaf that shuts with one hand and a stair that meets the requirement without changing how it looks.

Door clearance is two to three millimetres at head and sides, with the foot set to the floor covering that is going down. Hinge count follows leaf weight, so anything solid core or glazed takes three. Window profiles are recorded off the existing frame as dimensions, sightline, glazing bar width and cill projection, before anything is ordered, which matters more here than in most towns given the seven Category A listed buildings and two conservation areas. On a stair, a replacement newel is jointed into the existing string rather than face fixed over it, and balustrade spacing is brought to current requirements. The same method runs a job for anyone asking who does bespoke joinery in Tranent. Handrail height and going are measured against the existing pitch rather than assumed, because a stair built before the current requirements existed will rarely comply by accident and will often comply with a smaller change than people expect.