Fit-out contractors and shopfitters in London

Shopfitters take a retail unit from an empty shell, or from a previous tenant's fit-out, to a shop that can trade: the shopfront and glazing, the internal partitions and ceilings, the electrics and lighting, the joinery, counters and display, the flooring, the decoration and the signage. A good shopfitter also runs the programme around the centre's rules and the landlord's approvals, because in a trading centre those decide the opening date more than the build does.

Shopfitting is the retail end of it: shopfront, glazing, joinery, display, tills and lighting in a unit that has to trade the moment it reopens. Commercial fit-out is the wider job across offices, clinics, restaurants and cafés, taking a space from shell or from a previous tenant to something usable. The same crew does both; the sequencing and the approvals differ.

It depends on the state of the unit, the specification and the hours, so we do not publish a rate per square metre. What we do is price against a written specification and a survey of the unit, as a fixed sum rather than an estimate, with the out-of-hours working, the centre's permits and the landlord's requirements priced in from the start. Send the drawings or the brand package and the unit address and you get a figure you can put in front of a board.

Yes, and inside a trading shopping centre it is usually the only way. The unit is worked on after the centre closes, the hoarding goes back and the area is left clean before the doors open. Deliveries, waste and noisy work follow the centre's rules and the agreed permit times. The crew is our own, so the night shift is the same people.

Cat A is the landlord's base fit-out: raised floors, suspended ceilings, basic lighting, mechanical and electrical services and finished surfaces, handed over as a usable but empty space. Cat B is the occupier's fit-out on top of it: partitions, meeting rooms, tea points, joinery, branding and furniture. We work at either level, or take a space through both under one contract.

Yes. Where a brand has an approved package we build to it exactly, using the specified materials, finishes and fixtures rather than substituting them, so a store in Manchester matches one in London. We have done that on rollouts for Pop Mart, HEYTEA, Vibean and Herono. Where a drawing cannot be built as issued, we raise it before the work starts.

Yes. We prepare the drawings and method statements the landlord or centre management asks for, and we run the approvals, the licence to alter and the permits for access, deliveries and out-of-hours work. Your solicitor still handles the legal document itself. Starting this early matters, because approval times rather than build times are what usually move an opening date.