marble counters |

The Real Story On {or Pros & Cons of} Marble Countertops

I apologize to those of you who have emailed and asked when I would follow-up on my first post on my kitchen about the “pros” and “cons” of having white carrara marble counters in the kitchen. We have actually had them for almost a year in our {not so} new house now, so I thought it was a good time to give an assessment for those of you who are considering installing them.

Before I get into what having them has been like, let me say that the countertop fabricators will scare the life out of you if you want to install them. As I was told, they will not warranty them, so you will get what you get as far as damage, stains and scratches.

Let me also mention, for those who might be wondering, we paid a minimal upgrade for these over granite. I was told they are a natural stone and despite information to the contrary are not “that much more expensive” then other stone surfaces. Every area may be different, but that was a nice suprise. We also would have preferred “honed” {as honed doesn’t show scratches as much} vs. the shinier polished look we wound up with but had to go with what was in stock.

After much thought on what to say, the best way I can put it is that I still LOVE them and there is nothing out there like them. I can’t imagine any other type of stone would give my kitchen this same look and feel.

But are they a bit of a pain?

Yes.

Absolutely.

In my next house {or my forever house} if I have the chance to have even more control over the kitchen {we had a very short time frame to build, read more HERE}, I would probably use a different material at least on the sink/island area.

I really like to cook, so my counters get a lot of use. I have three kids, and frequent guests, so something that can handle spilled grape juice, spaghetti sauce and the worst culprits of all acids like lemon juice, orange juice and lemonade in the sink area might have made more sense.

I knew what I was getting into, don’t get me wrong.

But, here is a bit of what I have learned over the last year…

Water may leave a small mark but its not really that noticeable once they are sealed.

Don’t ever, not even for a second, put a lemon martini on the counter without a coaster on New Year’s Eve, even the tiny bit of acid around the bottom will etch a lovely ring in your brand new counter.

Guests do not really care that their red wine glass will leave a mark on your counter. I have also learned that since I don’t want my guests having to worry in my house, I am going to get stains on my counters.

Most people who come in your house will remark that your kitchen is really pretty, different, nice, etc. They may not care, or even know what marble counters are but the counters do add something “special” and still kind of unique and that’s kind of nice.

Don’t wear a belt and lean over your counter. Ever.

Unless you want a chip in your counter.

Marble has quite a bit of veining, so some of the spills and marks mix in with the natural colors in the marble and you won’t notice them. Our marble has this large white vein which I knew about before it was installed. I like it, I think it adds character.

Pay a professional to seal your counters. We did not, and its not really a fun job and not something I am looking forward to doing again. The better they are sealed, the less staining you will have.

Use sheets of glass (or something) to help protect the counters. We used some glass we had on hand to the right of our sink {the area shown above where I do most of my cooking prep} and in the desk area and they give us a “worry-free” zone.

Marble counters will get scratched, stained and marked up but they are still –in my opinion– really beautiful. After the first few scratches, stains and marks, its not such a big deal and you learn to let go.

To summarize, this is my take…if you are the kind of girl {do we have guy readers? If so, sorry} who doesn’t mind the pain of high heels and the extra time it takes to put on jewelry, these counters are for you. If you don’t like the hassle, I might suggest going a different direction.

As I remind my husband often, nobody ever said I wasn’t high-maintenance.

Like my counters

XO,

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New Kitchen

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When Terry was here visiting me recently she encouraged me to go ahead show some more pictures of my new kitchen. Though I consider it still “not done” (I am working on a backsplash, curtains and built-in seating) here it is as it currently stands. If you are new to Magnolia Lane, you can read more about our new home HERE. We built this home in the shortest time frame ever–(3 months from foundation to move-in, our builder was amazing)–so I was very limited in how I was able to customize my kitchen and had to make decisions very quickly. For comparison purposes, this is a picture of a home in our neighborhood with the standard floorplan. Its beautiful, but we don’t get a lot of natural light in our home so I went with as much white in the kitchen as I could, which is my taste anyway. As you can tell, this kitchen has more elements of the traditional “builder” kitchen. In our home, I totally reconfigured our appliances and passed on getting double ovens for two reasons: 1) I really don’t “bake” very much, and 2) we just couldn’t give up the counter/storage space. By using the credit in $ from the cost of two ovens, I was able to get a much nicer range. After much thought and research, I chose a Kenmore Elite 36″ range and I absolutely love it. I did consider –very seriously– a Viking as well as some other premium commercial ranges but after reading about repair issues, costs and wait times I decided to go with a more mainstream brand. It cooks like a dream, I highly recommend it and the bonus was the slightly lower price-tag. Much to my husband’s dismay I had the microwave built-in to our lower counter. This is apparently a horrible idea to anyone of the male species (he takes polls, and they all seem to agree), but I very much wanted it out of the line of sight (I wanted a clean line of cabinets looking into the kitchen from the family room). My husband has, by now, adjusted to it being lower then he would like, and it’s also a convection microwave to pitch in on the rare occasions when I actually need 2 ovens. I have already showed off my new built-in shelves HERE. And, as I mentioned I still need curtains on the large window and I am working on that. The ones I want are back-ordered at Ballard until April, so I may be DIY’ing some curtains here shortly as its very cold over by the window at this time of year. We also added the desk area at the end of the counter for homework and organizational space, having had a desk in the kitchen in my last home we knew we couldn’t live without it here. Pin It

Finally I plan to do a whole post on the pros and cons of marble countertops to share what I have now learned the hard way. We were lucky to able to upgrade from granite to Carrara marble with very little upcharge. I can say I absolutely LOVE how the counters look, and there isn’t anything else out there that is even similar in appearance. However, I will say they are as bad as you hear as far as scratching, maintenance and water stains.

If you are considering them PLEASE drop me a line here at Magnolia Lane and I will give you my thoughts on them. Its really like having fine furniture in your kitchen, I am fussy enough to deal with them but it is challenging and I am not sure would not get them again in my next home. (But don’t hold me to that!)

I will hopefully finish up the kitchen soon and be back with a final “reveal”. We are still deciding on the backsplash, I am leaning toward a marble subway tile. With the range hood we selected we have some challenges as to where to “stop” it, do we go to the ceiling? I am pinning backsplashes these days and there are some beautiful ones out there (follow me on Pinterest HERE). Its a tough call! Thoughts?

We do love this space. Terry’s new healthy cooking series is starting up in the next few days (don’t miss that). I am looking forward to cooking all her fabulous recipes right here!