Case study · Restaurants & Cafés
Carsons Tea House, Crowborough
Specifically, a small café kitchen design for Carsons Tea House in Crowborough. Retail unit transformed into a fully fitted commercial kitchen — extraction, hygienic finishes, equipment supply and bar fit-out, delivered in two weeks.
Client
Carsons Tea House
Location
Crowborough, East Sussex
Project value
Under £50k
Build time
2 weeks
The brief
Small café kitchen design: Turning a retail unit into a working café kitchen
Carsons Tea House needed to fit out a former retail space in Crowborough as a commercial kitchen from scratch — extraction, hygienic finishes, commercial catering equipment and a bar service area. Furthermore, all of this had to be delivered inside a tight two-week programme ahead of opening.
Consequently, the project required close coordination with the main contractor on the wider fit-out. Specifically, our scope covered the full kitchen: layout design, ventilation system, wall cladding, safety flooring, bar equipment, and supply and installation of all catering appliances — one team, one point of contact, no subcontract chain.
What we did
Design through to handover in two weeks
Kitchen layout and extraction
We designed the kitchen layout around the café's service model, zoning cooking, food prep and back-bar separately to keep staff workflow clean. Therefore, this approach ensures clean movement between zones during service. Furthermore, we installed a new extraction ventilation system covering the cooking line, sized and specified for the menu rather than as an off-the-shelf canopy. Consequently, the ventilation meets all current compliance standards.
Hygienic finishes
For hygiene compliance, we fitted Jemiclad UPVC hygienic wall panels across all kitchen and prep areas — durable, easy to clean, and fully compliant. Additionally, Polyflor slip-resistant vinyl was laid throughout, properly coved at the floor-wall junction for EHO compliance.
Equipment and bar fit-out
For the equipment, we supplied and installed the full catering equipment package: commercial cooking appliances, Sterling Pro refrigeration, Maidaid dishwasher and glasswasher, and bar fittings. Additionally, all equipment was sourced via Advantage Catering Equipment and specified for the café's daily service volumes.
Equipment specified
Key brands and products
- Maidaid — commercial dishwasher and glasswasher
- Sterling Pro — refrigerators and freezers
- Jemiclad — UPVC hygienic wall cladding
- Polyflor — slip-resistant safety vinyl flooring
The finished kitchen
Carsons Tea House — completed fit-out
The outcome
Opened on time, ready for service
As a result, the kitchen was handed over within the two-week programme, allowing Carsons Tea House to open on schedule. In particular, the full fit-out — extraction, cladding, flooring, equipment — was delivered by our in-house team with no subcontractors, coordinated alongside the main contractor's wider works.
Overall, this project shows what KCK delivers for new café openings. Moreover, our single-team approach eliminates the coordination problems that arise from multiple contractors. Therefore, clients open on time. Furthermore, having one point of contact throughout the build means faster decisions and clearer accountability. Consequently, Carsons Tea House was able to open to the public on schedule, with a kitchen that was fully compliant from day one.
- CEDA Member The Catering Equipment Distributors Association — UK's voice for foodservice equipment specialists.
- ISO 9001 · 14001 · 45001 Certified The only Kent commercial kitchen design-and-install firm certified to all three.
- F-Gas Certified Certified to handle and install refrigerants in commercial refrigeration and cooling equipment.
- Gas Safe Registered All commercial gas installations carried out by Gas Safe registered engineers.
- Part of Advantage Catering Equipment Kent's design, supply and service specialists since 2003.
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