2 Architects and a House: Kitchen Countertop

Shopping for a kitchen countertop was one our favorite shopping experiences for the house. I contacted a tile rep that my office uses quite frequently as they are also a stone fabricator, Elegance in Stone. While they had a several slabs in stock, they suggested we also look at a few warehouses that bring in stone from all over the world. These are essentially giant warehouses with hundreds of 5'x9' stone slabs. While there are several granite slabs that look verysimilar, there are these amazing quartzite slabs. One can't help but be amazed that the earth can produce such beauty below the surface!

After spending several hours at a 2 of these warehouses, we narrowed are selection down and then discussed pricing with our fabricator. Below you can see our selections: Black Soapstone, Sea Pearl, Madre Perola, and Straito Olympico.

Another really interesting part of the process is working with the fabricator once the slab is selected. As there is variations in the stone, we were able to select which part of the slab we wanted to use. Below is a photo of our template laid on the slab before it is cut.