Italian Marble Kitchens for London and the United Kingdom

Michelessi is not a dealer and does not work from a catalogue: it is a marble workshop with an in-house technical office, cutting centres and stonemasons who have handled stone all their lives.

• Made in Italy since 1976. The kitchen is designed and built entirely in Aprilia; what is installed in London is the very piece that stood in the workshop, not a copy made elsewhere.
• Slabs chosen one by one. We select the slab for your kitchen by eye and photograph it in full before a single cut, so that the veining that reaches your home is the one you approved.
• Numerically controlled cutting, hand finishing. Cutting centres give the precision a kitchen needs: joints as fine as a pencil line, mitred waterfall sides that carry the vein down the island without a break. Edges, profiles, carved sinks and the final polish are finished by hand.

More on the tools and the trades: our craftsmanship page; on the range: indoor marble kitchens.

A Georgian terrace in Islington, a Victorian villa in Richmond, a mews house in Belgravia or a lateral flat in Kensington each ask something different of the stone. London kitchens are often long and narrow, frequently in a lower-ground extension, and reached through hallways and staircases that set the size of the largest piece that can pass. We take this into account from the first drawing: every joint is placed so that each element passes through the doors and stairs of your house, and then disappears into the veining.

On our pages you will find the London vision, a Mayfair townhouse imagined stone by stone in our workshop, with a white statuario staircase, carved fireplaces and a travertine bathroom. It is a project vision from our drawing board, not a delivered commission, and it shows the character we would bring to a London home. Our project abroad is Dubai, described on the Dubai project page.

A marble kitchen is cut to the exact size of its room. When that room is in London, the method does not change; four steps simply receive extra care.

Measurements

We ask for photographs of the space, hand-drawn measurements of the walls and the position of windows, sockets, drains and the appliances you have chosen. If an architect or builder is on site, we work from their drawings. Where the project calls for it, our own team checks the final measurements on site before cutting.

The 3D design

From the measurements comes the three-dimensional design: the finished kitchen set within your room, with the layout of the units, the finishes and the veining of the chosen slab. You refine it with us and approve it before the stone is touched. What you see in the drawing is what comes out of the crate.

Samples sent to your home

The colour of a marble cannot be judged on a screen, least of all under the grey light of a London morning. We therefore send samples of the stones and finishes under consideration, so you can set them against your floors, your joinery and your windows. Only then is the slab confirmed.

Video calls

The workshop can be visited from a distance too. Over a video call we show you the slabs available, the chosen slab before cutting and, where the project allows, the kitchen dry-assembled before packing. Anyone who wishes is welcome in our Aprilia showroom, less than an hour from Rome.

Marble is heavy and, in its thinner sections, fragile. Every element is packed in the workshop once finished: pieces are protected individually, braced in crates built to the size of the load and numbered in the order of installation. The 3D design travels with the shipment, so whoever opens the crates knows where each piece belongs.

Installation is carried out by our own fitters: the craftsmen who followed the work in Aprilia travel with their tools, verify the measurements on site, level the worktops, close the joints along the veining and hand over a kitchen ready for use. Where a local builder or contractor is involved, we coordinate with them through working drawings. Transport, schedule and the formalities of shipping to the United Kingdom are defined in the quotation, according to the destination and the size of the project.

Indoors, the classic choices are Calacatta, Bianco Carrara, Statuario and Nero Marquina, with travertine and onyx for warmth or light. Worktops are typically 2 or 3 centimetres thick; a honed finish is gentler with the marks of daily use than a high polish, and we recommend an impregnating sealer, renewed regularly. For a busy family kitchen we also cut worktops in Dekton, quartz or Fenix and pair them with marble on the island or the splashback. See our guide on marble worktop care.

Outdoors, the British weather is damp, changeable and occasionally frosty, and the stone must be chosen accordingly. Granite, quartzite and sintered stone stand up to rain and frost with very little care; marble can be used, in the right finish, on covered terraces and loggias. Material by material, see our guide which stone to choose for an outdoor kitchen.

A garden in Surrey, a roof terrace in Shoreditch or a courtyard in Bath can hold an outdoor kitchen in marble and stone with sink, burners and storage, built to drawing and to measure. Where fire is part of the plan, barbecues and wood-fired ovens are made in refractory stone, the material ovens themselves are made of: we use no cement and build no masonry outdoors, because repeated heating and cooling break such structures down within a few years. Refractory stone is made for the flame and holds the heat season after season. The full range: refractory stone barbecues and kitchens.

A photograph of the room, hand-drawn measurements and an idea are enough. Write to info@michelessi.it or on WhatsApp, in English or in Italian: you will receive a first assessment, then the 3D design and a quotation with production, transport and installation defined for your address. The full method is on our Italian marble kitchens worldwide page; our details are on the contacts page. Since 1976 our marble has left Aprilia for homes in Italy and abroad; London is simply the next address.