Quote:
Originally Posted by Melkerson
shaft,
Thanks for the thorough response. Few more things:
1. When I said these high-end kitchen designers recommended quartz, part of the reason is that is what they used in their own kitchens at home. So, while I'm sure everything you say is true, I do believe that these people really think quartz is better for some reason. It's possible they're wrong about that, but I don't think it's as simple as "Let's do quartz because it's easier to work with and install"
2. If as you say stone is harder to work with, then shouldn't that be reflected in installation cost? Why would they install both for the same price if working with natural stone is so much harder than quartz?
3. As far as the UV light is concerned, my understanding is that home window glass blocsk out the majority of high energy UV light, so I assume this will severely mitigate any fading effects inside a kitchen.
Quartz and manufactured stone offers uniformity of color, it also has some recycled content. Manufactured stone has some VOCs and is mostly made offshore.
The beauty of stone is each slab is different, a lot of the designers we see in commercial work don't understand the variations in color and that a small piece is a part of the pictures.
That natural slab that you go pick is basically a one of a kind, lots of patterns similar in the family but it exists once in nature, variations in pattern, depth of color are what you need to choose. Natural slabs are not all the same size, quartz if made in regular and jumbo slabs.
We do very fine woodwork in commercial buildings and sell a lot of quartz as part of out contract in our area as contractors prefer a single source for coordination. We sell veneers from specific logs that don't repeat in Nature.
I have a job now with about a lot of wall panels in high rises and the architect is viewing a 6" sample and we can't get through to them that nature doesn't repeat like that, she looks at the log and likes the middle but not the ends. Its the tree they specified.
I have been doing this for over 40 years and the latest batch of designers and architects out of school at high name firms are just lost. 10 years ago I could could discuss issues with a senior architect now the really have no idea other than color pallet.
Back on subject, if you want uniformity of color and consistency in pattern go with manufactured stone, if you want the beauty of what nature creates go with natural stone, you have to live with it. The designer can't see it from her house.