I have honed dark granite right now and it stains like crazy esp anything remotely oily. Tried everything to seal it and nothing worked. It was in the house when we bought it and we are now remodeling the kitchen and it it will be gone. Replacing with polished Sea Pearl quartzite if the quote is right (fingers crossed). It's been a process because this kitchen has extremely high end (previous owner installed) cabinets with a high gloss finish in teal blue - gorgeous but challenging and way to expensive to replace. Very sleek and modern. Thanks to the oven forum we chose the Miele Master Chef oven (wanted that rotisserie) and warming drawer and after reading on the Refrigerator Forum we chose the Thermador Freedom Towers for the fridge and freezer. LOL we inquired about getting panels for them to match the cabinets and yikes, the cost was more than the appliances cost. So stainless fronts it is. Everyone here is so helpful - certainly appreciate this site and the forums.

Everyone is asking for a porcelain slab fabricator close to where they live. What I did was search on Houzz to find local contractors with porcelain slab installations. Then viewing work that they did a few years ago for any cracking particularly around the sink faucets. I did not have good experiences asking the material vendor for contractors for other projects I have done.

Reporting back that we have had Lapitec installed for about 3-4 weeks now. We ended up getting 3 cm because of large overhang on the peninsula. Unfortunately that overhang sent us into a 3rd slab. (We'll end up using the extra in a bathroom, rather than what we had originally planned.) We had a very good fabricator in our awesome contractor (Cornell's Quality Construction in Kirkland) who has his own shop and is certified through Pental for Lapitec installation. They did a very nice job, but I've been kicking myself that I forgot to ask for it to be flush around the sinks, and they did a negative reveal which is not my preference, especially if this stuff is prone to chipping. I have a big sink, so hopefully I can learn to keep things away from the edges. The first day, I whacked a baking sheet underneath the edge while washing it and it was fine, thank goodness. We got "Bianco Polare" which is a plain white, satin finish. It looks lovely, but is not without issues. It is nice and smooth. It is cold, and maybe a bit noisier than granite. Of course being plain white every darn crumb shows. But what is frustrating about it is that it marks up. There are grey marks on it from aluminum pans being set down, from moving countertop appliances to wipe under them, etc. Those grey marks do not just wipe off. I can either rub them with my finger like an eraser, or use a scrub like Mrs Meyer's. So they do come off, but what a pain. This was not something I even thought to test when I was trying to damage the sample I had. A friend of mine got Lapitec also - she got the glossy Lux finish, and the color is one of the lighter browns. She likes hers but says it always looks smudged unless she has just washed and dried it, which I think a glossy finish is prone to regardless. She has not commented on it marking up like mine does - maybe the Lux does not do that. I am not sure I would get Lapitec again. But I'm not sure what I would get instead.

Antartide quartzite slabs - do you know anything about this type of quartzite? I can't find information anywhere on line. The slabs show alot of mineral and have some sparkle; ranges in color from white/gray/tan to faint greens, blues and deep burgandy. Thanks.