Thank you, all, once again! Diy crazed, we are living with two Ikea "Udden" units flanking the range right now. They are topped with stainless counters and one has a small integral sink. They've been surprisingly functional and it was the convenience of being able to set hot heavy pans right on them and not having to worry about stains that first made us consider the stainless. The look, especially in winter, leaves me a little cold. One of my favorite kitchens in my files has ivory cabinets and zinc counters. We were so keen for zinc in the early days (zinc counters paired with a patterned encaustic tile floor a la french bistro--at least as reimagined by Thomas Keller--if you can believe it). In the end we decided to try be truer to the Victorian provenance of our house, but with quite a bit of allowance for contemporary conveniences and eclecticism. I'm having a difficult time visualizing the soapstone though. Thank you for your read of our kitchen. We may be too close to evalutate. Malhgold, those are my concerns exactly. The marble reference in the drawing is from an earlier iteration. We've made the decision for perimeter counters to be all one material. But I do know what you mean about the soapstone changing the tone. Next to black, lighter colours often read as white and texture fades. The other surfaces are not white because we were going for a kind of neutrals plus texture look. One of the considered options we will still have is to put a different patina on the bricks, or even paint them in the future. I installed them myself, to match the existing brick and concrete pillar. We're also having our cabinets hand painted on site, so one thing we've been contemplating is painting the island much darker. The entrance to the kitchen is through a small library (not yet installed) with dark stained, possibly black bookshelves and a white oak herringbone floor that our neighbour, a master woodworker, is going to be installing for us in the spring. Anyway, all this is to say that we've tried to build allowances for change into our plans and although the overall light look was our favourite for some time, we're starting to feel the need for some anchoring. Kitchendetective, unoiled soapstone is definitely something I'll consider. It looks almost like zinc unoiled and I think that softer colour will pick up some of the more subtle veining in the marble. I'm just concerned that it will darken regardless.--but the evolution of its surface is also appealing. Finally after my long winded response, Vtkitchengirl. My pendants are called "Franklin pendant". Their finish is antique silver (and they do tarnish!). I bought mine at Ginger's in Toronto, but if you google the name, I think you'll find other distributors in the US.

We are finishing up on our new build kitchen and will have all stainless appliances and sink with ORB faucet. I also have warm colors and somewhat of a rustic theme with warm tile floor and stained knotty alder cabinets. I have seen ORB faucets with stainless sinks in person and in my opinion it looks good as long as it coordinates with the rest of the room such as with lighting and knobs ( also what I'm doing)....and its best if the sink is undermount so the faucet is not touching the sink. Here's a picture of my sink without the faucet; I will try to post again when faucet and lighting is in. I hope that helps :)

Your budget is directly at odds with your aims. Cheepchinesecrapola comes in all stainless top. Which has had issues with radioactivity. Theres nothingvwring with a good quality non import brass body faucet.

oh boy, my sympathies for your problem. I hope u exhausted every avenue with your contractor to correct your counter problem. i don't understand how they can say they are fine when the finishes are different? that alone is cause for a re-do!! now onto your problem as is: first i would not do a SS backsplash. way too much SS. next, glass-while nice i don't think it goes with your cab style since glass lean to the modern. i still think you can do tile but it must be very uniform. but if that off the table, then i would pick one color that is the same in the counters and use that for the b/s. u can use quartz or corian. corian has lots of solid colors and is very easy to clean. best case scenario, find sea pearl to match your counters and use that for the b/s.