granite is da bomb

silestone is AWESOME

OP here, thanks for all of the suggestions. We are doing a quick kitchen update to sell within the year and our realtor advised us to use the most trendy finishes and surfaces if we did the update. I don't want to sink our budget and overdo it because then I'll never want to move (among the more obvious reasons). I was thinking granite from Home Depot/Lowes, but then I saw all of the other options. I actually don't think those big box retailers will customize (like honed granite) or that would seem like a good option. We are replacing floors too, which makes it that much more fun.

I have marble and it has NO stains. Everyone, even my contractor who did our kitchen, tried talking me out of marble because of the stains. So I spoke with several friends with marble all of them and they all said that their marble hasn't stained and no one regrets installing marble. To see for myself, I got a marble sample (not sealed) from the counter place. We put everything we could think of it (ketchup, red wine, soy sauce, punch) and let it sit a while. The only time the sample ended up with stains-very slight ones- was when we let the substances sit overnight. My marble was sealed when it was installed 1.5 years ago. I have a messy husband who loves to cook and two messy kids. We don't baby the counter or do anything crazy to keep them clean. And yet, we have no staining at all and I am so happy I didn't let anyone scare me away from marble.

BTW- The man who owns the "granite" countertop store where we bought the marble told me he has marble in his kitchen at home.

I think granite never goes out of style. Marble stains. Go with granite!

We are closing on a house and while I was not enamored with the kitchen countertops, I could not really figure out why. They are supposedly granite, but they just didn't look right to me, and I thought they might be corian, but I'm pretty sure, upon looking at what people are talking about here, that they are ceasarstone. I just thought it was really unattractive granite...

My house is up-to-date and I didn't even know it!

If you're not doing it just for looks/sale... as a serious cook, I agree with the mixed surfaces. I have stainless around the sink, marble, butcher block and laminate. I'm not trying to impress anyone but myself with my countertops, and the laminate doesn't really stain, so it works beautifully wherever I don't need the others.

PP, you rejected granite for staining but went with marble? Doesn't marble stain mucho?

Other PP - thanks for the tip on the local quarries. My hesitation with most stones is the environmental impact, especially when people put in something fashionable that could last hundreds of years but will be ripped out in ten.

What's "current" is mixed surface. A mix of task-specific surfaces, like you'd see in a commercial kitchen.

More on soapstone:

It is impervious to bacteria--that's why it's used in labs. So it's perfect for a kitchen.

There are at least two soapstone quarries in VA, within a couple of hours of DC. So you can go pick your own slab, right from the source.

Granite is out people. Designers have moved on, so should you. It looks dated. It makes everyone think "housing bubble flipper!" Ovah!!!

Here's an example of honed granite:



This looks 100x better to me than the polished variety but I agree that upkeep can be a bit more challenging.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Soapstone is as good as it gets, if you want something that won't date. It does patinate, but nicely, and it's warm to the touch. Everything else besides maple, steel and the classic marbles goes out in the blink of an eye.

I agree. I love it but it does scratch and chip easily.

I love our soapstone countertop. It does scratch, but they can easily be sanded out. Add a little mineral oil and everything looks perfect again (if that's what you want).

This blog post was helpful to me - alternatives to Carrera marble: http://aubreyandlindsay.blogspot.com/2012/05/3-counter-alternatives-to-carerra.html

Anonymous wrote:Granite is not timeless. It's already looking dated and in five to ten years, it's going to look seriously dated. We are also looking for an alternative though I haven't found one I'm ready to commit to yet.

I agree that granite is already dated, even honed granite. And I would avoid honed granite and honed Ceasarstone/Silestone because of the issue with staining and upkeep.

We just redid our kitchen and considered every possible material for countertops. We ended up going with marble. My second choice would have been soapstone.