My house was built in 1906, so we don't want to stray too far from a traditional or transitional look. That said, my husband vetoed hex marble flooring so I went with large scale faux-marble, which strikes me as verging toward modern. For the counter, I'm drawn toward quartz, which also reads modern in most settings. I guess I'm open minded, but don't want something that's totally out of sync with my Edwardian house.

The flooring is porcelain 12x12; it's called Marmi Statuario Veneto, by Isis USA. It has a creamy, warm tone to it, as opposed to a blue-gray tone that seems to be the other option with marble look-alikes.

The vanity is cherry with a medium cherry finish and a fairly traditional looking door/drawer. The counter will be 60" long with a single undermount sink (Toto cotton white) and a traditional looking chrome faucet.

The shower will be white on white - basically bands of white subway and probably arabesque, plus faux-marble if I can find one I like that has a glossy finish.

I'm showing photos of all the finalist options, with the counter sample set on top of the floor tile, next to a drawer front that I'm in the process of refinishing.

Here's quartz in "concrete". It has tiny bubbles of grays - looks a lot like polished concrete:

Here's "snowy" quartz - a lot like concrete in terms of bubble size/texture:

Here's Verde Antiqua marble, honed finish. This color is almost a perfect match to Restoration Hardware's Silver Sage color; we have a fair bit of that color in the house elsewhere, so I was naturally drawn to this marble when I first began looking.

Here's a quartz in "nougat", which has lots bigger flakes and more movement than the Snowy or Concrete:

Finally, here's carrara, which is obviously very gray compared to my tile. Although initially the counter of my dreams, I've cooled off on this one as I've looked around:

Kevin, I really like your counters. Thanks for the link. Oddly, this week is the first time I've considered a darker counter (i.e. the concrete quartz). Now that my husband has shown some interest in that look, I guess I'll pursue it a bit more. His main requirement is that it look plain and clean, so anything with much pattern won't make the cut. You're sure right about perseverance!

But you're right, enduring, I do like contrast, pattern and color. So the gray, which so nicely picks up the gray from the floor, looks pretty good to me. I found a new option that's a bit lighter gray - Silestone grey expo. My husband likes it best of all. I just worry that gray will give the room too much of a modern twist, when the other elements are pretty traditional. (To give an idea of the general tone of the house, I'm including a picture of the bathroom window, which will be between the vanity and toilet, and is the first thing you see when you walk into the room. The clawfoot tub is leaving us to make way for a walk-in shower.)

I'm still fond of the greenish gray marble, but it is not my husband's fave, and it is a little busy, perhaps.

Thanks everyone for your input!

More pix soon...

kirkhall - I once lived in a house with cultured marble, so I'm somewhat of an expert :) That felt like plastic, while this product feels exactly like natural stone, but with a perfectly smooth finish. I wouldn't say it looks identical to marble because the veining in marble is just different. What I like about this is that the background is less gray than in most of the marble I looked at, yet it looks more natural than some of the other quartz products. My husband likes that it's ...almost... white. And it was important that it is pretty bulletproof. Yes, it feels good to the hand.

Pental makes this product, enduring. It's called Chroma Quartz, and Lattice is the name of the color/pattern. It was not on my short list but I kept visiting the same stoneyard for remnants, and this turned up one day. I bought it on the spot, and am so happy I did. It turns out to be nearly an exact match for my faux marble flooring, so I'm just in a happy little faux paradise!

sofla - This is 3 cm thickness, so about 1 inch. They didn't need to build up the edges, since this was 3 cm stone.

Thank you so much!

It seems like it would be a good match for the floor.

But - my only hesitation might be that having a real marble vanity top might make the porcelain floor look artificial - hard to say without seeing it in person.

Any reason for not doing a marble floor, as it seems it's clearly a favorite material of yours.

Our admittedly tiny sink top with the calacatta 12x12 floor.

Any information would be appreciated. Thanks