In my last house, I wanted to paint the family room a soft, buttery yellow. It took seven quarts of paint (and big swatches of each on the wall that I stared at for weeks) to make the decision. When I finally chose one, I gave a girlfriend all the quarts I didn't use. She mixed them all together and painted her kitchen. It looked great.
Chris and I have found a way to help slow this kind of craziness. I pick three colors or three sofas or three lamps that I can live with, and he makes the final choice. This works out quite well.
In our kitchen, we have replaced all the major appliances as they've died off and painted the walls beige (after I had already painted it two shades of green that I didn't like). Now we will choose countertops.
 The OUTDATED laminate countertops must go. |
Of course, I want granite. From what I read, granite is the standard now, even in the most modest homes. It's what buyers expect. But it's expensive. So we look at some alternatives:
"High-Definition" Laminate--for about a 1/10 of the cost of granite, we can install HD laminate that looks like granite. We go to Lowes to see it. It looks like fake granite. No, thank you.
Granite Tiles--also a fraction of the cost of granite slabs, but to keep the cost down, we'd have to install it ourselves. We've tiled before, so I get online to see what's involved. Too many steps. It could take years. Next.
Trend Stone--an engineered surface that mixes ground granite and quartz with a polymer, so it looks like a mix between granite and solid-surface. Nice, but almost as expensive as granite. If we're going to spend this much, why not just get granite? (This is called rationalization; something I am brilliant at.)
So, after much deliberation, it is granite. We choose granite.
I MUST HAVE GRANITE.
Hey there. My brother, who can build a house from the ground up, says that granite is nice but better alternative might be Silestone Quartz. I've seen that and it's beautiful. I'd rather have it, then the granite tile I have. It comes in lots of colors and just looks "soft." I've heard that granite can emit low traces of radon, and while it's not a huge danger, there is some possibility that it may bother some people, but there are testing kits you can buy. My brother also really likes Corian and put that all over his kitchen and his kitchen is pretty nice. He says it's loads cheaper, too. Good luck! I'm the same way - I'll obsess about stuff, too!
ReplyDeleteAh, yes...I forgot to include in the list, but we did look at Silestone and Corian(as well as concrete, which is very cool but a bit too modern for our traditional home). Oddly enough, the solid surfaces were a bit more expensive than granite. Maybe we're shopping in the wrong places!
ReplyDeleteI haven't heard about problems with radon, but will check into that. However, I think we've made up our minds...
take a color theory class at an art school or wherever... that would probably help. :)
ReplyDelete