Example photo by Pete Alexopoulos on Unsplash, not our project
Kensington and Chelsea · London
Alcove units in Notting Hill, Kensington and Chelsea
Alcove units in Notting Hill: cupboards and shelves built into the alcoves beside a chimney breast. Each piece is designed at a visit to your home, built in our workshop and fitted by us.
- Alcoves that aren’t square
- Everyday clutter left on show
- Old alcove cupboards that have seen better days
Alcove units designed for your room
Alcove units in Notting Hill
Many people choose cupboards at low level and shelves above them. The cupboards take the things you’d rather not see, while the shelves hold books and the things you want on show. The top of the cupboard makes a useful surface at a comfortable height. We set the heights to suit the room and what you will store. If you’re living with space for a growing book collection and toys and paperwork with no proper home, that’s what alcove units are for, made from moisture-resistant MDF and birch plywood, spray-painted or hand-painted.
Picture rails, deep skirting boards and plaster cornices are part of the character of older houses, and they set the lines that alcove units have to meet. Homes built before 1919 make up a large share of the housing around Notting Hill, so those details are worth looking at closely at the measuring visit. The top of the furniture can stop at the picture rail or carry on to the cornice, whichever suits the room.
The quote comes in writing, so there is time to read it properly. It covers the design, materials and finish agreed at the visit.
- Place
- Notting Hill (W11, W8, W2)
- Area
- Kensington and Chelsea
- Prices
- Quoted for your room
- First step
- We visit, measure, then quote
- Made
- Workshop-made, then fitted
- Materials and finish
- MDF and plywood, painted to order
- Fitting days
- Weekdays; Saturdays on request
- Get in touch
- Our contact form
- Page updated
- 27 October 2026
Could you do it yourself?
The real difference is in the fit: edges scribed to the wall, a level base on a sloping floor and a neat line where the furniture meets the ceiling. Off-the-shelf furniture can’t usually do that in an older room.
Shop-bought shelves can sag over a long span. Span, depth and the weight on it decide whether a shelf sags, so a long run needs a thicker shelf, a stiffening lip or a support. That is something we plan for in the design.
FAQs: alcove units in Notting Hill
Is parking a problem for fitting in Notting Hill?
It can be: much of inner London is covered by controlled parking zones. Depending on the street, a visitor permit, a paid bay or a bay suspension through the council may be needed, and suspensions often need notice. Let us know what parking is near you at the measuring visit.
Can you fit furniture in a home close to Shepherds Bush station?
Yes, homes across Kensington and Chelsea and the rest of London are within the area we cover. You can tell us about the room on our contact form to arrange a design visit.
Does fitted furniture need planning permission?
Not normally. Fitted furniture inside a house does not normally need planning permission, even in a conservation area. Listed buildings may need listed building consent for works that affect their character, so ask the council’s conservation officer.
What do you do at the measuring visit?
It’s a chance to measure properly and talk through what you’d like. We look at the walls, floors and anything the furniture has to work around, and the written quote comes afterwards.
What happens to the chimney vent when alcove units go in?
We design around any vent so it stays open. Air moving through a capped chimney helps stop damp, which protects the units as well as the wall. Any existing damp should be dealt with before the units go in.
Do I need to be in when you fit?
We need someone to let us in at the start of the day. It also helps to have someone around at the end, so we can go over the finished furniture together.
Bespoke alcove units or ready-made?
Bespoke furniture is not instant: it needs a design visit, a quote and time in the workshop. In return, the unit is planned for your alcove alone. Standard units assume square rooms, and period homes seldom have them, so you end up with gaps, wobbles and units that do not meet the skirting. Fitted pieces follow the wall and sit level.
What goes inside matters as much as the outside: drawers take more making than shelves, and each rail, divider or pull-out adds to the work. We’ll talk through what you need inside during the design visit, and the quote follows.
Why choose Bespoke Carpentry in Notting Hill
- Spray painted or hand painted, in the colour you choose
- Made in our workshop, then fitted in your home
- Saturday visits and fitting by arrangement
- Every London borough and the City of London covered
Take a look at our comparison of bespoke and off-the-shelf and how to compare quotes.
Places near Notting Hill
More for homes in Notting Hill
Elsewhere in Kensington and Chelsea
Alcove Units across all 13 places in Kensington and Chelsea
All services in Kensington and Chelsea
All London boroughs
More about alcove units
Tips worth knowing
Most of what helps is simple. Here’s what we suggest:
- Have any damp looked at before the units are made
- Check whether there is a vent in the chimney breast
- Measure anything large that must fit inside, like a record player
- Think about what you will store before we meet
To clean painted units, a soft cloth that is barely damp is enough. Skip scouring pads and harsh cleaners, which can dull or mark the paint. Dry the surface afterwards.
Put coasters or mats under anything that holds water, since standing water can mark painted shelves. Wipe up spills right away.
Flats, blocks and rented homes
For a rented home, access for the design visit and fitting day has to be agreed with the tenants. A letting agent can arrange this on a landlord’s behalf, and the written quote can go to whoever needs it.
If your building is on a red route or a busy main road, getting the furniture from the van to the door needs planning. TfL runs the red routes, and the stopping rules are strict, so tell us about it during the design visit.
Living-room carpentry in Notting Hill: local notes
In the area around Notting Hill, the largest groups of homes date from before 1919 (about 69%) and between 1973 and 1999 (about 11%), in the VOA’s 2025 council tax stock figures. We take that into account during the design visit, since older and newer walls take different fixings. Part of Notting Hill is in the Ladbroke Conservation Area, according to Historic England’s records. The controls in a conservation area are mostly about the outside of buildings, so furniture fitted inside a house does not normally need planning permission. Your council can advise if you are unsure. Controlled parking zones cover much of inner London, and each borough runs its own. A van working in Notting Hill will usually need a visitor permit, a paid bay or a bay suspension arranged through the council, which often needs notice. It helps to let us know about parking at the measuring visit.
Close to Holland Park? Alcove units can be planned to frame a window with a view rather than block it. Near listed buildings like Cosmic House, under half a mile south-west of the centre of Notting Hill, 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. If you live in a flat close to Shepherds Bush station, each piece is planned so it can be carried up and joined together in the room.
Notting Hill is in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, about 1 mile south of Kensington. Notting Hill is part of the area we cover, and the process is the same everywhere we work. Our work takes in places right across Kensington and Chelsea.
We work across the W11, W8 and W2 postcode area for alcove units. You will find streets here like Walmer Road, Aubrey Road and Sirdar Road, and homes on each of them are within our area for alcove units. The A402 and A4204 runs close to Notting Hill, so if your home is on a main road, mention it when you get in touch. Neighbouring places we cover for alcove units include Holland Park (1 mile south), Notting Dale (1 mile north-west), Kensington (1 mile south), Shepherd's Bush (1 mile south-west) and White City (1 mile west). We also make alcove units in nearby places such as Brompton (2 miles south-east), Chelsea (2 miles south-east), South Kensington (2 miles south-east), World's End (2 miles south-east) and Little Chelsea (2 miles south-east).
Near you in Notting Hill
In Notting Hill, that includes homes near The Sun In Splendour pub, Kensington School and Holland Park School. For rail, the closest station is Shepherds Bush station, about 0.6 miles south-west of the centre. Other landmarks nearby include Paddington General Hospital (1 mile north) and Greek Orthodox Cathedral Treasury Museum (0.6 miles east). Open spaces near Notting Hill include Campden Hill and The Long Water.
How fitting works for alcove units
You won’t need to do much on the day. We need someone to let us in at the start, and the room should already be cleared, as we’ll have talked about during the design visit. From there, we protect the floors, bring the furniture in and get on with the fitting. How long the fitting takes depends on the size of the alcoves and what goes in them, and the fitting days are set out in your quote. On fitting day in an older house, the main job is scribing to walls and levelling on floors that slope, so each piece is trimmed and adjusted on site. Floors are protected, and dust is kept down as far as possible. Parking can be tight on terraced streets, so let us know about permits and bays at the design visit.
- You get in touch to say you’d like alcove units, with a note of the room they’re in.
- A design visit follows, where we measure up and agree the layout with you.
- We put the design, materials and finish into a written quote.
- The units are built in our workshop from moisture-resistant MDF and birch plywood.
- The units are fitted in your home, ready to fill.
Preparing the room
- Point out meters, boilers and fuse boards near the furniture
- Keep pets in another room while we work
- Take down pictures, mirrors and shelves from the wall
Starting with a design visit
The quote is built from the design visit. We take full measurements, see how true the walls and floors are and work through the design together. A written quote follows the visit for you to look over. To arrange the visit, message us from the contact page.