Some of the places in the Boston area like Gerrity are one-stop shopping. I got my granite there and they fabricated and installed it for me - at the time I didn't even know that you could have a fabricator separate from the granite yard. Of course, since you're not local, they may well have arrangements to sell just the granite so you can have it fabricated/installed locally. Definitely make appointments so that they'll be prepared to move slabs for you. Another place I've heard recommended is Sudbury Granite but I have no experience with them.

I'm located in NH. Our KD only had us go to the Boston Granite Exchange. We made an appointment for a Saturday. If I were to do it again, I would go during the week, as I believe they would be less busy. When we got there, they asked us who our fabricator would be. Again, we used the one our KD recommended (Stone One in Methuen, MA--very close to BGE).

At BGE they handed us a clipboard and showed us how to record numbers off the ends of the slabs. We spent several hours going up and down and back and forth the rows writing down information. Then we narrowed it down to about 3 and looked and relooked at those. I ended up taking pictures with my cell phone and emailing them to the KD for her input.

We went in thinking we wanted something dark with an antiqued finish. In the end, that's what we decided on with Blue in the Night Antiqued. The granite was installed this past Monday and I love it.

The Saturday we went happened to be Valentine's Day, so I got a different type of stone that day! It really was a fun experience.

Good Luck!

I live in New Hampshire and went to Marble & Granite in Westwood (huge selection!) and Gerrity as well as several other smaller stoneyards. I had used Gerrity previously for my guest bathroom. My fabricator/installer for my kitchen was in Tewksbury, MA.

In addition to camera and cabinet door, bring along a copy of your layout with measurements. Don't worry too much about not knowing what you want, this is your first outing! When I reserved some slabs at Marble & Granite they asked for the name of my fabricator. I think they said they'd hold them for 2 weeks.

Good luck!

Erika

BGE in Haverhill is huge. They claim to have over 200 different granites and marbles (and a few onyx and soaps) in stock at all times...and they're friendly...and they'll allow you to wander around the warehouse for as long as you want. We just built in North Andover, which is the next town over, and I probably went there 8-10 times over the course of a few monthsÂone word of caution thoughÂitÂs totally overwhelmingÂespecially if youÂre going to visit 3 or 4 places, you might end up seeing 500 different stones in one dayÂclear your mind, go to a happy place, and have fun with itÂand take notes, because they ALL start to look the same after a whileÂ

EleMar North is Lowell is the only other large warehouse I went to. They were also nice, and the selection was good, but itÂs not even half the size of BGE.

I live in NH and have been to all of those as well. What I have learned is that if you find a good local fabricator who is not attached to a granite warehouse you will save yourself some money. The different granite and marble warehouses charge different amounts for the same stone. Boston Granite Exchange has the most granite you will ever see anywhere in New England. The selection is unmatched but they charge the fabricator more for their slabs, thus your price goes up. Marble and Granite in Westwood was the next most expensive for slabs, than Gerrity and than finally Elemar North has the best prices. Their selection is not as vast as the others, but they have some very nice stones, I would definitely put them on your list.

I would leave yourself an hour at each location. Personally, I would take Marble and Granite in Westwood off of my list. You can hit BGE, Gerrity and EleMar more easily in one day and the Westwood location is quite a drive and won't have different granite selections than you would find in the other three.

Good luck.

We went to Marble & Granite in Westwood. I was a bit disappointed as we were not allowed to wander up and down the aisles to look at the slabs. There was an area of slabs on display, but they were exotic and pricey. We had a staff person with us to check out some slabs but you really had to have narrowed it down before going. They gladly brought slabs from the aisle out for you to view, but since we did not get to see them in the aisles, it was hard to know what to ask to have brought out except for the ones we were considering. The positive is that they will hold stones for 2 weeks without any commitment.
If you do plan to go there, spend some time on their website first. It has nice pictures of slabs and a color price guide.

Bring your camera and a pad of paper and write down those lot numbers no matter where you go.

When I was looking Sudbury Granite did not have a lot of honed stone. That was two years ago, so it may have changed. I ended up at Gerrity and had a good experience with them. At the time, they had a good variety of honed and polished stones. I ended up with Antiqued Nordic Black. Good luck.

I'm in NH. & we went to most of the places listed above. I agree with the fact that BGE has an unbelievable selection but you'll be paying more for it. A few other good fabricators are Ripano stone in Nashua & Merrimack Stone in Merrimack NH. We went with Merrimack & have been very happy so far.

I agree with boxerpups about Ripano's. I've seen some of their kitchens and they do beautiful fabrications and installations but they don't have a wide selection of stone. I also noticed that they stick right with you, don't really let you walk around ... I think they're worried you'll try and pull out a slab and crush yourself? Ripano's was also the most expensive of all the quotes I collected for the stones I was interested in.

agree with what someone else said about shopping during the week is better than the weekend.

You might want to visit Gerrity and the place in Haverhill on one trip and see where you get. Their locations are close enough to each other that you won't be spending more time driving than looking at stone. possibly you could add in the place in Marlborough but mapquest it. If you could start out at Gerrity with a 10 am appt (assuming you are coming down Rt. 95). and plan to be in Haverill for 12:30 (you'd take rte. 93 I think to get up there which is close by to where Gerrity is) and Marlborough (I think you'd take rte. 495 from haverill) at 3:30 or so I think you could do all three. you will hit traffic getting back to Maine late in the day

depending on how long it takes to get from Maine and what time of day you are travelling it could take a while to get from one point to another. Rte. 128 is a bear during rush hour and this is what you'd be on to get down to Westwood.

I would plan at least an hour at each place. If you like to ponder things the way I do, then plan an hour and a half.

also, wanted to mention Cumar in Everett. huge place in a creepy industrial park and very difficult to find even with directions, but enormous selection. try the others first though.

Hello,

I was just at Gerrity and BGE last week.. and the week before that..and before that :)

They both have a nice stone selection but both places stated that they have cleared out a lot inventory and have cut back on ordering due to the poor economy. I actually feel like Gerrity has the bigger selection of the two. I think it's safe to say you will spend 2 hours (at least) at each place. The people at Gerrity are super helpful and have a lot on staff on to spend the time with you. The people at BGE are also good but maybe not as readily available... but I have never made an appointment at either place.

Best of luck and try not to get overwhelmed!

Thank you all so much!! This info is enormously helpful, I really appreciate it.

I'm going to call for appointments tomorrow and head down on Monday. Yikes!

Our drywall gets hung tomorrow, so we are at least a week away fro cabinet install. It has been an awful few weeks (hence my lack of posts here). We had to have some major, unforseen excavation in the yard, due to an unknown drainage problem and massive mold outbreak that was making me sick. When I was moving some shrubs and beds out of the way of the backhoe, I apparently dug up a bed of (un-leafed-out poison ivy roots... and got an extreme case of systemic posion ivy (in the bloodstream.) I have been on massively high doses of Prednisone for it which has made me very ill and out-of-it, and last week couldn't sleep more than 2 hours at a stretch.

In the interim, we were working like CRAZY till all hours trying to get ready for dywall (we are DIY-ing the plumbing, electrical, insulation, etc) because we're already so far behind and cooking on a hotplate in the dusty hall is getting really old.

Anyway- we'll get through it. And it's spring, and our new neighborhood is so lovely this time of year, and the garden is growing and I'm discovering all the plants and flowers I have. Including, unfortunately, lots of poison ivy :(

Anyway thanks so much for your help. I feel so much better armed with this info!

Stacey

You have some good places there. Gerrity's in Woburn is where we bought our granite and the Ocean Green they are holding for you is probably the one I tearfully had to give up when it was determined there wasn't enough to do our kitchen. They installed our granite about 2 weeks ago and I ended up with AB, which I absolutely love. I can't say enough about Gerrity--they were wonderful to work with. Boston Granite Exchange is also great for seeing a large selection. I found Cumar's in Everett to be quite expensive and the same with Stone Technologies in Woburn. I agree with the above posters, you need at least an hour at each yard.
Maureen in MA

Gerrity - Great to deal with - did an amazing job on an outdoor table for me from a remnant piece

Marble and Granite in Westwood - Selected my marble slab and THREE times they sent the wrong slab to the fabricator. HORRIBLE to deal with!!

Interior Stone and Tile - Waltham - AWFUL/THE WORST EVER - My fabricator (that my builder recommended) for my kitchen soapstone an marble pantry - Kitchen was ok, but not great - They very obviously do not often work with Soapstone. But job went ok - though some small issues.

The Pantry though was a total BOTCH JOB!! They templated but cut my marble wrong and when I commented the piece was too short they still tried to install it! I refused and then they bonded a piece to the end- They did not template correctly so I could literally slide my fingers between the wall and the counter. They put almost an inch of caulking along the wall - Just horrible! They charged my credit card even though I would not sign off on the horrible work - And to make matters worse they actually charged my credit card before the work was even done!! They also made a surround for my fireplace, they broke it on installation and glued it on broken anyway. (Shame on me for giving them my credit card). Owner was nice to my face but totally did not try to resolve the problems once he left the job site. My cabinet maker told me he had never seen a counter installation so poorly done in his 20+ years of installing cabinets. After all this they refused to refund any of our money and we had to take it up with American Express - We won!!! Thank goodness! DO NOT USE INTERIOR STONE IN WALTHAM!!!

Thank you all.

I have my appointments... I am going to Boston Granite Exchange at 10:00, Gerrity at 12:00, and LeaMar at 2:00. I am not going to Marble & Granite, so hopefully I will hav enough time for these three and it won't be too grueling. Thank you so much for your input on this!

I also just sat down with DH and looked at clippings of kithcens to try to narrow down our choices. Since our kitchen is in a rather dark corner we've decided to cross anything really dark off the list (i.e. Jet Mist honed or similar). So it is down to either honed Ocean Green, or something much lighter.

I am hoping that th salesmen will be able to steer me in the right direction if I say I want something honed, soft, and light, and not "speckledy".... do you think so?

Also- of the three places I am going, Gerrity would do their own install, but if I find something at the others, they'll tag it under one of my possible local installers names, and then change the hold name when I finalize my installer. Does that sound right?

Drywall is hung! We can see the space! So exciting!!!!!!!

Staceyneil,
just curious how your appointments went...

I second Willowdecor's many thumbs down on Interior Stone of Waltham. Dreadful, dreadful work. They did the bathroom for us as they were the people our designer used. Really bad. Gorgeous stone but awful job preparing and fabricating it. Only an okay installation. Unfortunately, I wasn't around when they did the installation or else I'd have rejected it. Our designer was a yes-man to everyone but us and so meekly okay'd the stone they brought in. It was only over time that I realized the many instances of shoddy job they did.

Fortunately, I used Sudbury Granite and not Interior Stone for the kitchen. Fortunately. Interior Stone was awful. Sudbury's fabricator is fantastic but the particular designer we had (Valerie) not so much.