I was going to suggest a Zodiaq quartz, but I'm pretty sure they're more expensive than most granites.

{{!gwi}}

Have you visited any granite places? I'd take a sample cabinet door and visit a few stoneyards. There are many, many beautiful light colored granites.

This is what I've been wrestling with. My cabinets will be alder...almost the same color as yours, with medium colored hard wood floors and almost exactly the same amount of counterspace. And I too have tried to be very resouceful with respect to budget. I finally decided last week to go with Bianco Antico granite for my island, (still not sure what to do for the perimeter) but it's a little bit of a budget buster. It's considered to be a mid-priced granite. I don't think you'll find any light granites on the low end. Also, I was shocked to find that often the quartz and corians can cost more than granite!!!

How about a pre fab slab in a color like Venetian Gold?

Speaking of quartz being more expensive, check these out:

Concetto

I think I'm in LOVE!!!!

Here is a link that might be useful: Concetto quartz by Ceasarstone

Hm, the bianco antico looks really pretty! I'll have to price it out, but I'm guessing it's over-budget since I like it. :)

I'm not sure how/where I can find pre-fab granite...

I just went granite shopping 3 days ago and came home with samples of:

-ivory white
-river white
-ivory fantasy
-kashmir white
-delecatus
-bianco antico
-bianco napoleono

The top 4 were all lowest grade price (they were all As in a A-D price scale, D being most expensive). I didn't write down how expensive the last one was.

I am a granite lover so I am bias but I wanted to say I really like your floors. I would never have guessed it was laminate. It looks great! I also love your cabs and your cute wine rack. Good luck!

Thanks for the compliments jan_jan, and thanks everyone for the help!

I'm a little leery about light granite because I heard it can stain pretty easily. Oh well, I guess I'll just have to go to the stone yard and check it out!

Quartz isn't more expensive than granite, usually-- it's around the same price, in my experience. Cheaper than the expensive granites, around the same as the less expensive ones. I would at least take a look at quartz because it could look really pretty with your kitchen.

In my area, quartz was significantly more than most granites I looked at. then again, Kashmir White granite was mid-range up here, no lower-tier, so it just goes to show you how much things vary!!!

I recommend getting out there and looking at stuff (bring a cabinet door with you) and getting pricing from SEVERAL places. And it never hurts to ask, "Is that your best price?". I had one place come down $800 on some granite when I asked.

It's going to be lovely!!!

>In my area, quartz was significantly more than most granites I looked at.

Likewise here.

When I first started looking, it was the same here (the first 2 shops I visted).

After that, almost everyone else I looked at (at least 3 more, including my cabinet maker who does granite and Ceasarstone) said it was just about the same price, maybe slightly higher, but just barely.

So maybe it depends on the shop?

I think that the world out there could make renovating a kitchen MUCH easier by having something sort of resembling consistent pricing! It's so annoying to have to price out things like Caesarstone, which should be the same price for certified (or whatever the word is) installers.

(rant over)

Anyway, looking around is the only way, and maybe even bargaining if you feel up to it.

I can't speak to granite, but at this point I am intimately familiar with cs and can tell you that many of them would look terrific in your kitchen. There are a lot of very smooth light ones that are beautiful with darker wood-- like baja (SO pretty but turned too yellow in my kitchen), Jerusalem sand, desert limestone, and cinder (which is grey-ish but subtle-- it's what I'm going to use). You might as well check them out while you are looking around.

I'm looking for a whiter countertop also and going to price out some stone in the next few days. I have about the same sq. footage as you too. I'll let you know what kind of price range I get for any whites just to give you an idea (I'm in CT). At least I might be able to give you a ballpark figure for a couple of whites out there. It's so hard not to be able to just see what you like and kind of ballpark the price. Those different color grades on the slabs apparently don't mean much, it's more up to the fabricator. I just want to know if I'm looking at 2K or 10K! People say that granite is expensive but what $1K is to one person is totally different to another.

BTW - I like the lighter paint splotch you have in the upper left corner of the picture.

Wow, great points about the pricing! I went to another place last night, and while their low-end granite was around $45-60/sq ft. installed, their quartz (can't remember brands) started at $70+! I really think quartz would look fantastic in my kitchen and I'd worry a lot less about staining, but I just don't think I can justify the price compared to the natural beauty and resellability (ha, is that a word??) of granite.

swickbb, I'm liking that color too! I found a really cool-looking dark-ish blue that I LOVE next to the cabinets, but overall I think it's too dark for this room (unless I go with striking white quartz counters!). I think the color you're looking at is Silver Sage, from Restoration Hardware.

I just got through visiting a few of the bigger slab yards around here as well as a few independant shops that fabricate and asking a ton of questions to both re the pricing structure, and here's what I learned:

- sometimes the shops will buy their granite (or get ahold of it somehow - they didn't exactly use the word "purchase" so I don't know if they are picking it up from the slab yards or making their own contacts in the industry or what), but it comes out of their own lot, and then are evidently able to pass on stellar deals, but obviously the choices would be very limited. This might be why you sometimes see granite advertised as $35 sq ft installed and wonder what's going on there to be so cheap?!

- The slab yards told me the price is really determined by the fabricator. So for instance, my cabinet maker charges $65 sq ft for granite, and that is with a $22 sq ft allowance for the granite. So if you, at the yard, pick a $34 sq ft granite, cabinetmakers cost goes up to $75 sq ft.

So I am assuming my cab guy is making $43 sq ft profit.

That also indicates approx. how much he is for Ceasarstone: $67 sq ft or so.....

Don't forget about Bianco Romano Granite if you are looking for a light granite. It would be clasified as a medium grain rather than the fine grain of Kashmir White. It has gorgeous blue/gray veins. Though my floor is porcelain tile with a walnut glaze it is very close to your floor colour. I think it has enough colour interest to work well with your lovely cabinet colour.

Here is a close up of a small section on the sink wall - this section happens to be very textured.

and a larger view of it on the island. This shows more of the overall texture. There is a bit of floor showing too.

Sorry, I should have added a photo from the other angle that shows the floors in a more subdued light which shows it closer to your floor colour. Though it doesn't show up that great, my kitchen table is similar to the colour of your cabinets.

Here you go:

Thanks, Katienic! I just saw that type of granite the other night, and that definitely might work-- it's beautiful! Of course, every slab is different. I'm doing a bit more looking this weekend for comparison, so we'll see how it goes.

I'm not sure if you'll see this post again, but if you do, could you please share the paint color you have on your walls? Also, I clicked on one of your pics and it took me to your online album-- forgive me for snooping, but did you have your cutlery dividers custom-made buy your cabinet company? They look perfect!

Yes, the cabinet maker included the drawer dividers for both drawers in his quote to me and he made them to custom fit whichever drawer size I picked for placement. This was one of the things that definitely set him apart from anyone else I interviewed.

The paint is BM Silver Fox. It is a beautiful shade. It is a gray that tends toward a taupe/blue. In one of the photos in the album of the empty room you will see the end wall with the silver fox on the wall, but a little bit of Revere Pewter down at the bottom where the baseboard would be. Though I liked the RP at first, I found it a little too green and a little too light next to the Bianco Romano Granite. The depth of the SF really allows the granite to POP!

Good luck with your granite hunting!

Back from the fabricator run today. I ended up finding one white that totally rocks (no pun intended). It's called super white and it's actually a quartzite which looks like white and gray marble and is stunning without the marble worries. Great stuff. Price? $90 sq ft. UGH. I think there is some room for negotiation so depending on where you go for searching for your granite don't be afraid to ask if they are willing to come down a little.

Here's what it looks like:

In the picture the super white is sitting on a white laminate counter (against a darker cabinet than you have) that is probably 30 yrs. old if not more. We just bought the house 3 mo. ago and the KD dated it to that. He couldn't believe it still looked so white and nice after so long. So there you go. High end (but not highest) white granite/quartzite price.

There are medium range priced whites as well but you will have to see how they go against your cabinets. Anything with gold looked absolutely awful with the colors in the fireplace you can see from my kitchen. So make sure you take into effect any colors in your room when looking at the whites. Good luck! Have fun! Bring a camera and take pictures and bring home a piece to see how they look and TAKE YOUR TIME deciding!