My parents have had it for the 12 years they've owned a 20 year old house. Surrounding all tubs and a shower stall. Not one problem. Mother is 83 and does all her own cleaning and is particular. She always had tiled showers before, and would never go back now. There is a seam in each corner.

I'm thinking about using it in my 2 most-used baths on the wall behind the sinks. I think it is a less expensive alternative to the thin Corian sheets. Want to run the backsplashes 18" high, up to a long mirror wall. Easy upkeep is the name of my game!

jkom51 and ashlander both have cultured marble or granite. Hopefully, they'll chime in, too.

I think this is what the contractor I had in last week was suggesting to me for my shower. We are taking out a tub/shower kit and replacing with a big shower that has little or no lip. I am not too fond of the idea of the grout and am very confused over the whole thing of having to seal the different products. I have to admit, I don't know much about any in particular, although I have been reading here and other places a lot. I want to get moving on this, but am truly baffled. I don't want problems.

He mentioned the slabs or sheets of this (I think) which he said would only have the thin lines like was said.

I have marble countertops in both bathrooms, but don't know what it is called. We are planning to replace both--one in the master bath just to update and match the new jetted tub that will go in in place of the tub/shower combo. The other one is a 60s-70s blue that I am looking forward to replacing.

Would the countertops from that era be the cultured marble? Does that mean it is the polished look? I definitely don't want something that will be slick and have to worry about that. Also, I am concerned about water spots. DOes anyone know if this has problems with spots.

I am wanting something with color==not just the white---it just isn't me.

THanks in advance and I would love to see pics of showers.

My FIL just built a new home and his shower is completely cultured marble. We are beginning our new home soon and we will also have marble in all the showers. I have to say that FIL's marble is not my favorite color, but asthetically the material is really nice. There are very few seams because the sheets are about 4'x 8'.

I have to say that if I had a maid, I'd much rather have some beautiful tile, but the dirty grout is something I just can't live with!

I highly recommend the marble. Just make sure you check out the installers work first. I've seen some very bad mixes with cultured marble resulting in a very blotchy ugly mess. I think a good installer will mix it alot or a little, according to the look you want. It also comes in cultured granite, which is a very nice look-but a little more expensive (around here, anyway).

After it's installed, you can also put a good car wax on it so that the water beads off-no water spots!

Ideally, it's probably not the high-end finish some homes command, but in my part of the world, many very nice homes use it.

I have a cultured marble counter top in a bathroom now. It's 40 years old and is finally starting to show it's age, but is still okay to use! I'll see if I can find some good pics to post...

We've had cultured marble for 25 years in 2 baths. There's bad and good. Good is no grout lines and a fairly easy cleanup. Bad is the non-descript look...the shine did not stay, and we did use car wax. It just turned dull.

After about 15 years or so, one spot on the tub surround began to have a greenish hue (something in the water?) and I never was able to get it off. To be fair, I didn't try everything. I knew we were replacing it eventually. We've just now completed the master bath remodel....granite on the double vanity and on the ledge of the linen hutch and porcelain tile on the floor and tub surround.

Susan ~

Ashlander,
Do you have pics you could share?

Here's our cultured granite neo-angle showerpan & surround (you can't see it, but to the left there is a matching 6' double sink vanity top of the same cultured granite). It was much cheaper for us to do cultured granite than to do Swanstone, which was our original intention.

Finished in May 2003. We love it, it's a breeze to take care of, and would happily do it again; everybody who sees it wants one too!

printersdevil:

Here are pictures of our cultured granite shower with frameless baroque glass.

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Love your shower! I'm going with what appears to be the same material in both of my bathrooms. Do you recall the name of your shower head/valve set? Looks like what I am looking for.

Knelly

knelly:
We bought Grohe fixtures from Faucets4Cheap.com
The shower head set is the Grohe Movario Shower Set Five in Polished Chrome with Geneva Volume Control trim lever in polished chrome; also, Geneva Thermostat trim in polished chrome; also the rough-in valves.

The second volume control is for our Grohe rain shower head (28-373).

Ashlander's DH (Frank, AKA "Ashlander2").

Oops! Sorrry, knelly. DH did not read carefully and thought that you were asking about our shower set-up. I think he needs to spend more time here for a better understanding of these messages instead of criticizing me for spending too much time here. LOL
ashlander

ashlander, I thought that's what knelly was asking too. What did you think knelly was asking about?

Now I'm wondering what I was asking about ! ;^)
Thanks Frank--you did answer my question!

Knelly

Thanks for the pictures. I went over to the place that does the fabrication yesterday to check things out. They had quite a few displays for us to see and the one of the cultured granite looked very much like the one posted by Ashlander. Thanks.

I like the darker color of the cultured granite walls, but am leaning back toward the cultured marble at the moment. I was really surprised that all of the marble ones are so, so white or bisque or the ivory. But, hey, I guess after all the 60s and 70s colors, this is better. I have a perfectly fine 76-77 inch marble top in hall bath with a blue marble color. I love blue, but it is such a dated color. The commode and tub kit are all in this color. It is going soon!!!!

My vanity countertop in the master bath is much more neutral. It is probably the harvest gold swirls in the marble, but it actually looks like a nice tan or something along those lines. It is still okay, except that one of the sinks is beginning to pick up the surface cracks a little. It is the sink that we use the most. Also the sinks are in the shell shape and are so, so shallow. Oh yeah, the tub kit and the commode are in harvest gold. (YUCK---I remember having harvest gold fridge, stove, washer and dryer and thinking they were the greatest at the time!

We are about to totally redo both baths.

Anyway, I am leaning toward the cultured marble and am going to have them add more of the color dust that I want. They explained how they make this and the very small amount of the color dust that is added to the vat. I asked about doubling that or more. I was told that doubling the color would dramically change the swirls and make the color show more. So, I think I will go that way.

In the master bath, we are adding a Jetta tub and since I love pink and mauve and don't particulary care for white, I am ordering it is the Innocent Blush color. It is not a pink, but I think a very nice NONE WHITE, non bique or non ivory. I will use the cultured marble called pearl and mauve. They will add double the amount of mauve dust. This will still be a subtle amount of color.

In the other bathroom the shower will be the pearl and champaigne color--again with double the color.

I can't make up my mind about a shower door, so I think I am going without one at first. I can always add it. We really won't use the shower that much and I think I will add a curtain at the moment. My neice owns a glass company, so I can have them do it later.

I have to make a decision soon, so we can get this underway.

THanks for the photos.

So what is the difference between cultured granite and engineered stone?