Coving and corner guards were not blog topics on the old site. They were SKUs: folded from sheet, 304, often 1.2 mm, made to a wall. The journal keeps them because they are how a bench meets a wall without a dirt step, and how a plaster corner survives a trolley.
Alltradestainlesssteel.com.au does not fold them. It describes why a commercial kitchen that cannot be wiped is not finished, however shiny the top is. FSANZ and state enforcement talk about cleanable premises. They do not publish a magical profile number. The metal habit that keeps getting rewarded is a radius you can hose and an arris you can hit with a trolley without opening the wall.
Coving
A cove is a radius you can wipe. Food rooms use it at floor and sometimes at bench upstands. Stainless coving is a folded or pressed profile, not a blob of sealant. Fixing should not invent a dirt ledge. Ends need returns or they become open knives.
Match the alloy to the room: 304 indoor, 316 if the hose and the salt deserve it. Finish is usually No. 4 so it belongs with the bench — finishes.
Floor cove versus bench upstand
A floor cove is the intersection of wall and floor. It exists so a mop and a wash-down hose do not leave a square cave of soil. The profile has to sit tight, fall with the floor, and finish at doorways without a raw shear that cuts a boot. Returns at ends. A gap behind the cove is a dirt hotel you cannot see until someone pulls it.
A bench upstand is the intersection of top and wall. A folded upstand on the top itself is often the cleanest detail: one piece, one grain, no extra joint. A separate cove strip is what you use when the top is already in or the wall is the thing being finished. Either way, do not run a square silicone fillet and call the job hygienic. Silicone splits. It greys. A cloth cannot get into the square.
Commercial kitchen stainless requirements is the room-scale essay. This one is the fold.
What the old catalogue was really selling
The historic in-house language was thickness, alloy, and a profile that could be made to a wall. 1.2 mm 304 was common because it marks less than a toy gauge and still follows an out-of-plumb kitchen. Thinner dents. Thicker fights the wall and shows every hollow. Confirm the job. A coolroom, a pot-wash and a plaster corridor are not the same duty.
Food-grade stainless is the use case, not a third stamp on the cove. If the room is brine, seafood, or a coastal open kitchen, write 316. If it is a Melbourne indoor café, 304 is not a downgrade.
Corner guards
The historic note is the useful one: folded slightly over 90° to hug a corner after you allow for the internal radius. Specify height, leg widths, thickness, and whether the top is returned or left as a shear. A raw shear at head height is a laceration.
Folded angle is the cousin. A guard is just an angle with a purpose and a better conversation about the wall.
Geometry that actually sits
Walls are not 90°. A 90° guard on a plaster arris with an internal radius will stand off and rock. The old shop folded slightly acute — often talked about as a touch past 90° the other way, so the legs pinch the corner. That is still the geometry. Measure the wall. Allow for render lumps. A guard that only touches on two high spots will dent on the first trolley and whistle when you wipe it.
Typical legs in a kitchen corridor are in the 50 × 50 mm conversation. Wider legs hide more damage and hide more dirt if you cannot wipe behind them. Height is a trolley question: 1200 mm, 1500 mm, full height. Write it. “Some stainless on the corners” is how you get three different heights in one room.
Return the top if a head or a hand will find it. Leave a shear only where nothing living goes. Deburr. Film on until paint is done.
Install
Walls are not square. A slightly acute fold helps. Fixings in a food splash zone want covering or placing where a cloth can go around them. Do not mix carbon-steel screws with a 316 guard in a wash-down corridor — A2 versus A4.
Protect the finish until paint and plaster are done. Brick acid is how a new guard looks twenty years old.
Fixings, film and the trades that come after
A food splash zone does not want a line of raw screw heads collecting fat. Prefer a hidden or capped fixing, or place the head where the cloth travels. Seal the hole you must make. A leaking fix behind a floor cove is a smell.
Use labelled stainless. A2 is the indoor inland default. A4 is the wet, coastal, pool-adjacent and wash-down default. Carbon screws in a 316 guard are a brown halo and a contamination story. See 304 versus 316 if the alloy choice is still open, and coastal care if the corridor opens to salt air.
Leave PVC on. Plasterers, painters and tilers will find the metal. Cement splash and hydrochloric brick cleaner etch a No. 4 in an afternoon. Peel at handover, wash with a neutral detergent, dry. Cleaning without chlorides is the ongoing rule.
If you weld on site — joining lengths, returning an end — cut the film back, keep the heat out of the remaining adhesive, remove tint, and passivate. A heat-tint stripe at a floor cove is a dirt magnet and a tea-stain start.
Where they belong, and where they do not
| Location | Profile | Alloy / fixings | Why it is there |
|---|---|---|---|
| Commercial kitchen floor–wall | Floor cove, returned ends | 304 / A2 indoor; 316 / A4 if wash-down or salt | Wipe and hose without a dirt cave |
| Bench to wall | Folded upstand or cove strip | Match the bench | The inspector’s wipe test |
| Plaster corridor / trolley path | Corner guard, fold ~92°, returned top | 304 indoor | Stops the arris becoming food-room paint chips |
| Coolroom or wet store | Cove + guards as the room needs | Often 304; 316 if specified | Same wipe logic, more condensation |
| Coastal open kitchen / poolside servery | Cove and guards | 316 / A4 | Salt or chlorinated mist plus fat |
| Decorative dry lobby | Optional guard | 304 is plenty | Traffic, not hygiene |
An outdoor kitchen that is also a food room still wants a wipeable upstand. A servery beside a pool fence is tasting chlorinated mist — pool and marine fittings start to apply. Do not specify 304 indoor coving on a surf-facing barbecue wall and then wonder why the strip brown-stripes.
The kitchens and hygiene hub is the rest of the food-side map. Rails and screens beside the room are 316 balustrade territory, not coving with a better view.
Specification
“304, No. 4, 1.2 mm, 50 × 50 corner guard, 1500 high, fold 92°, filmed, 316/A4 fixings if wet.” That sentence is a product. “Some stainless on the corners” is not. See also commercial kitchens.
Write the profile (floor cove, bench cove, guard), the legs, the height, the fold, the finish, the alloy, the film, and the fasteners. Note returns. Note whether the wall is plaster, tile or panel, because the fix changes. Note wash-down. Note salt.
Tea staining on a new guard is often swarf or acid, not a wrong alloy. Identify the dirt before you buy a cleaner. The old catalogue already knew the fold. The journal is here so the fold still gets written down.