Example photo by Pete Alexopoulos on Unsplash, not our project
Merton · London
Alcove units in Kingston Vale, Merton
Alcove units in Kingston Vale: cupboards and shelves built into the alcoves beside a chimney breast. Every piece is made in our workshop and fitted in your home, with a spray or hand-painted finish.
- Furniture that does not fit the alcove
- Bare alcoves beside the fireplace
- Storage that suits a period room
Alcove units for your home in Kingston Vale
Could you do it yourself?
Where bespoke earns its keep is in rooms that are not square. Older London rooms tend to have leaning walls, sloping floors and alcoves of different widths, which leaves standard units with gaps at the sides and top.
Long shelves are where off-the-shelf often struggles. How much a shelf bends depends on its span, depth and load, and long runs need a thicker shelf, a lip along the front or a support. We design shelves with that in mind.
About our alcove units in Kingston Vale
A classic layout is a low cupboard with open shelves above. The cupboards take the things you’d rather not see, and the shelves are for books and favourite objects. The top of the cupboard makes a useful surface at a comfortable height. We set the heights to suit the room and what you’ll store. If you are living with clutter with nowhere to go and bare alcoves beside the fireplace, alcove units made from birch plywood and moisture-resistant MDF with a spray-painted or hand-painted finish can solve it.
In a semi from the 1920s or 1930s, the front room typically has a bay at one end and a chimney breast on the side wall. Around Kingston Vale, interwar houses, semis and detached homes make up a big part of the housing, so it’s a layout worth planning for. We tend to plan alcove units along the chimney breast wall so the bay keeps its light, though every room is measured first.
We write quotes in plain English, without jargon. They say what will be made, what it is made from and how it will be finished.
- Where
- Kingston Vale (SW15, KT2, SW20)
- Area
- Merton
- Price
- Quoted for your room
- First step
- A design visit: we measure and talk it through
- Made
- Workshop-made, then fitted
- Boards and paint
- MDF and birch plywood, painted
- When we fit
- Weekdays (Saturdays if arranged)
- Enquiries
- Send us a message
- Last updated
- 27 October 2026
Places near Kingston Vale
More for homes in Kingston Vale
Your questions about alcove units in Kingston Vale
Can you make alcove units for a home in Kingston Vale?
Yes. We cover all of Merton and the rest of London, and Kingston Vale is part of that. The first step is a design visit, where we measure and discuss the design, and then we send a quote.
I live near Raynes Park station. Is that in your area?
Yes. We cover all of Merton and the rest of London. You can message us from the contact page to arrange a design visit, and tell us about parking and access at the same time.
Can you build alcove units for alcoves that aren’t square?
Yes. Most period alcoves are out of square in some way, so we scribe each unit to follow the wall. Adjustable feet or a plinth take care of a floor that slopes.
Is an outside wall a problem for fitted furniture?
It needs a little planning: leaving ventilation behind and inside helps stop condensation. We don’t treat damp, so any damp should be sorted before fitting day.
Can the fitting be on a Saturday?
Yes, by prior arrangement. Tell us when you contact us if a Saturday suits you best.
Do both alcove units have to match?
That is your choice. A matching pair balances the chimney breast, but many people put a desk or a TV in one alcove and cupboards in the other. We can keep the details the same so they still look like a pair.
How fitting day works
On the morning of the fitting, the first job is covering the floors and protecting the way in from the front door. Next, we carry in the sections built in our workshop. How long the fitting takes depends on the size of the alcoves and what goes in them, and your quote sets out the fitting days. Fitting day means carrying in the sections, joining them and fitting them to the walls. Spray-painted pieces come finished from the workshop, while hand painting can happen on site. Saturday fitting is possible by arrangement.
- You tell us which room it is and roughly what you’d like in the alcoves.
- We visit to measure, look at how the walls run and note the skirting, picture rail and any vent. We also talk through heights, doors and shelves.
- We send a written quote setting out the layout, materials and finish. If anything needs changing, just tell us.
- The cupboards and shelves are then built in our workshop.
- Fitting day: the units go in, are scribed to the alcoves and levelled on a plinth or feet. The finish is sprayed in our workshop or hand-painted on site, as agreed.
How to prepare
- Let us know where the boiler and meters are
- Mention any parking restrictions on your street
- Empty the space we will be working in
Arranging a design visit
For a quote for alcove units in Kingston Vale, fill in our short enquiry form. Let us know which room it is and roughly what you have in mind. We’ll arrange a design visit, then send a quote in writing.
Related advice
The problems alcove units solve
Moving into a period house often prompts it. New owners want storage that suits the house, and the alcoves are the natural place for it. It is also a good moment, before the room fills up.
These come up often when people first get in touch:
- Somewhere to keep books and records
- Clutter with nowhere to go
- Walls too uneven for standard furniture
- Empty alcoves either side of the chimney breast
Near listed buildings like Dorich House, about 0.6 miles north-west of the centre of Kingston Vale, older homes may keep original joinery that alcove units can be designed around. For a listed home, fixing into original features can require listed building consent.
Choosing a carpenter
- How they’ll get the furniture into the room
- How they deal with uneven walls and floors
- Whether they can show you real projects they’ve done
- Will the doors close with even gaps?
When you need someone else
It helps to know what’s outside our work before you plan:
- Treating damp in the chimney breast or walls
- Removing or altering a chimney breast, which is structural work
- Replastering, which is a plasterer’s job
If you’re not sure what’s possible in your room, you can send us a few details through our contact form and we’ll give you a straight answer before you arrange a visit. How it works.
What goes into it
- Hand-painted finish
- Moisture-resistant MDF
- Scribed side panels
- Adjustable shelves
- Birch plywood
- Panelled or flat doors
- Spray-painted finish
Pricing alcove units in Kingston Vale
To work out the quote, we look at:
- What goes inside: rails, shelves, drawers and dividers
- Doors and drawers, and how many
- Spray painting or hand painting
- How easy it is to get the furniture into the room
Rooms that are not square take more work: walls that lean, floors that slope and sloping ceilings all mean more scribing and cutting. The quote allows for it, which we write after seeing the room.
What to send when you get in touch
What helps most when you first contact us:
- What kind of home it is, and which floor the room is on
- How you want to use the space
- Approximate measurements of the space
- Your postcode and the borough
Pictures help us understand the room before we visit. A few pictures showing the walls, the corners and where the ceiling meets them give us a good feel for the space. To share them, get in touch through our contact form, and we’ll suggest a time for a design visit.
Living-room storage in Kingston Vale
In the area around Kingston Vale, the largest groups of homes date from between 1919 and 1939 (about 45%) and between 1945 and 1972 (about 24%), on the Valuation Office Agency’s council tax figures for 2025. Knowing roughly when a home was built helps, because walls and fixings change from one era to the next. Within a mile of the centre of Kingston Vale, 6 conservation areas are recorded by Historic England. Historic England says England has around 10,000, and the controls mainly cover the outside of buildings, so fitted furniture inside a house does not normally need planning permission. The Ultra Low Emission Zone has covered all of London since it reached the outer boroughs on 29 August 2023. It applies to the vans that deliver and fit furniture in Kingston Vale, as it does anywhere else in London. We plan parking and access with you at the measuring visit.
The wider area includes historic houses such as Southside House, about 1.2 miles south-east. If your own home is a period one, picture rails and cornices give alcove units a line to finish at. If your children go to Robin Hood Primary School or a school nearby, low doors that small hands can open, with books and ornaments higher up, suit a busy family room.
Kingston Vale is about 2 miles east of Wimbledon, in the London Borough of Merton. Design visits and fitting in Kingston Vale can be on a Saturday, by arrangement. Across Merton, we cover Kingston Vale, along with the rest of the borough.
Every address in SW15, KT2 and SW20 is within our area for alcove units. You’ll find streets here like Keswick Avenue, Derwent Avenue and Robin Hood Lane, and homes on each of them are within our area for alcove units. Main roads around Kingston Vale include the A308. We also cover the places around Kingston Vale: Putney Vale (1 mile north), Coombe Hill (1 mile west), Coombe (1 mile south-west), Copse Hill (1 mile south-east) and Crooked Billet (1 mile south-east). Across the rest of Merton, our area takes in Wimbledon (2 miles east), Colliers Wood (4 miles east), Morden (3 miles south-east), Eastfields (4 miles east), South Wimbledon (2 miles east) and Merton Abbey (3 miles east).
Local landmarks in Kingston Vale
In Kingston Vale, that includes homes near Duke of Cambridge pub, The Norwegian School in London and Hall School Wimbledon, among other places. For rail, the closest station is Raynes Park station, roughly 1.7 miles south-east of the centre. A little further out are Wimbledon Windmill Museum (1 mile north-east) and Atkinson Morley Hospital (1 mile south-east). Not far away are Kingston Hill Road area and Fishpond Wood and Beverley Meads.