Slab Taping

OK, that sounds like a bad title.

But, that's exactly what we did last Saturday.

We went to our countertop fabricator to tape up the Calacatta slab we finally chose after months of searching for the "right" countertop.

Choosing  the material for our countertop was very tricky for us, especially for me.

When I scoured the internet and looked through kitchen renovation books for inspiration, I have loved the look of white kitchens especially the ones with Calacatta Oro countertop. Like these ones:

See the similarities (besides the flowers in almost every photo)?

My vision for our new kitchen is, surprise, a white kitchen with a white marble countertop.
That might be boring for most people, but it just happens to be what I am drawn to and inspired by. The movement in the marble reminded me of my grandma's furniture with marble top. So lovely!

Of course, marble etches, scratches and stains. So, not the most "low maintenance" sort of countertop.

At some point during the big countertop search (which took months), we were tempted to go with a quartzite like Madre Perla:

Madre Perla slab looks great, right?

This is D's favorite kitchen, and it uses Madre Perla as countertop

Look at this kitchen with Madre Perla countertop and backsplash. Stunning!

We tested our sample marble and Madre Perla pieces with tomato ketchup, pineapple chunks, lemon juice, mustard, vinegar, strawberries, chilli sauce, soy sauce and all sorts of food items in our kitchen that is acidic and can stain. Marble etches and stains. Madre Perla doesn't.

Ohhh, it was really tempting to go with the Madre Perla. But, it didn't feel right for some reasons.

Thankfully, D was super supportive and helpful. He encouraged me to stick to my vision rather than caving in to practicality. (Thank you, Honey!) In the end, I decided to follow my original vision which has inspired me to begin with.

So, last Saturday was basically the end of the long search for countertop. Now, we can move forward to the installation phase.

Our project manager moving our slab for viewing and taping

I saw this Calcatta Oro slab in September but didn't decide on it until March

Our project manager started taping the "L" part of the countertop

Here, he was taping the countertop above the dishwasher

I wasn't keen on losing part of the beautiful marbling to the sink...

So, we retaped that area and moved the dishwasher countertop a bit lower so I get to keep that lovely grey patch

OK, so now all the countertop pieces were selected and the taping process was completed

Then, we found this remnant piece of a pre-fab quartz for the china cab countertop

The whole kit and kaboodle

Can't wait to show you the final product. The countertop will be installed on next Tuesday 4/2/13!