You wanted honest opinions so I will share mine and tell you in advance that if you love corona you won't love my opinion.

First, you say to you stone is a cold look. To me a natural product, stone or wood or even metal is a warm look. Warm because they are earth based products I guess. But when I walk into a kitchen with huge chunks of plastic in the kitchen, I feel down right chilly. Nothing screams cold and artificial to me than slabs of plastic.

I've had two corona kitchens. The sinks are yucky, and polishing out scratches is not as easy as they say! Mine cracked in a few places near the cooktop as well. Yuck yuck yuck. Hate the stuff....I hate leaning on plastic.

I also...dh and I actually, cook in our kitchen. I love the ability to put anything anywhere (on stone or stainless) whether it's hot or cold. We use a great deal of china and antique glass and I don't baby that any more than our counters and we don't break things on the counters any more than we did in the plastic kitchen. I did get a fairly large pattern in m y granite because it does not show streaks or fingertips...I will say that that would and did bother me in dh's black granite kitchen in Houston but with our granite it's not an issue.

I have a five year old and a clumsy cook and our granite is not chipped at all after hard use. I suppose some are softer than others but we made sure to get one that was a work horse.

To me the warmest kitchens I've been in are in homes that are hundreds of years old in Europe. Full of unfitted pieces gathered over generations. Work worn and beat up sometimes even :). And you never see big huge chunks of plastic in those homes.

I've bought and sold many homes and I always lowball a plastic kitchen because it has to be removed for resale or for corporate leasing. I also always put in a high quality stainless sink because they preform so well. Cheap stainless will rust easily and look like crap quickly especially in a commercial setting like the Ronald McDonald house. But there is a reason you find stainless in all professional kitchens. It's quality that lasts.

Ok so controversy or not....that's my opinion :). I don't share it with people when in their plastic kitchens....but I do think "yuck" as soon as I see it.