I've lived in many apartments and homes while attending college and moving for my employer and so I have experienced many sinks. I've never liked porcelain ones. I didn't like cleaning the stains. The older sinks in older homes we're always marred up. I've never known a clean, white porcelain sink in a kitchen. Stainless sinks were easier to keep clean and didn't break as many glasses in my experience. I opted for stainless in my new kitchen. It replaced an avacado green porcelain sink. That one always looked dingy and was starting to crack around the sprayer hole and rust was showing around the drains. It was 27 years old. I was very glad to get rid of it. My son who is 10 got sentimental about taking out the sink that was featured in so many of his baby sink-pictures. I offered to save the sink for him so it's now in our barn LOL.

My experience w/porcelain stinks growing up was that they stained easily, always looked grungy, and cracked. I had a cheap, builder's grade stainless steel sink in my old kitchen that was still in great shape 13 years later so we went w/SS again in our new kitchen.

I have to admit, though, that I wish had looked into Silgranit sinks...but I don't remember knowing about them back then (2007), so I didn't consider them. I'm not saying I would have chosen differently...I'm saying I wish I had checked them out to see what they were like (I might have chosen differently...but I don't know that for certain.)

So, I suggest you look at as many options as possible: Silgranit (granite composite)
Stainless steel
Fireclay
If you have soapstone counters, soapstone sink
Solid surface (like Corian)
Copper
etc.

I've always liked white sinks and never liked stainless - so I looked at fireclay and cast iron (also flirted with soapstone to go with the counter...) ended up with a kohler single bowl cast iron in white - its big, deep, and undermount and i just love it - try that - if you like the old porcelain sinks, i htink you will love these.

L

Hmmm....that should have been "porcelain sinks" not "stinks"!!

My mom has a porcelain sink and I hate it because I feel like I am either gong to damage the sink if I drop something or crack a glass.

I had a stainless sink and didn't like it because it had a metallic smell that I would pick up when I scrubbed it.

I have a black siligranit sink for a few years and I LOVE it. None of those issues and it always looks brand new. We're renovating our kitchen right now and I am getting the same sink again!

I've always liked porcelain sinks and have one that's 10 years old. It's suddenly become quite difficult to keep it clean. I don't know if the smoothness "wears off" after some years, or what.

I really wanted a porcelain or quartech (from Elkay, similar to silgranit) sink, but was won over by the accessories and "prep system" configuration of the new Kohler Stages sink. It's stainless and an undermount, the absolute opposite of what I thought I would get. It's at the fabricator right now, so I don't yet have a report on functionality, how it looks, etc.

As previously mentioned, do look at everything before making up your mind: stainless, copper, silgranit, quartech, porcelain. It's great that there are so many choices.

Great comments! I never thought of Silgranite, I assumed that it was a composite material and I tend to shy away from that. But your positive comments will prompt a good look.
What do others think? Anyone lived with quartech?

Buehl, I thought sure that the "stinks" was intentional tongue in cheek, LOL.

I've only had porcelain or stainless. Much prefer stainless. Love stainless with grid.

I'm not a fan of stainless for the noise and the spotting; got a fireclay apron sink this time around and couldn't be happier. It cleans up better than my old porcelain sink and the texture is slightly silkier, if that makes sense.

Definitely see all your choices in person if at all possible. Sinks are such a tactile choice and thus very individual.

Current porcelain sinks are much much much different than past ones. Most manufacturers don't do real porcelain any more. And there always were big differences in the good vs. yucky porcelain.

If you're buying a brand new sink, get Kohler cast iron. It's a high fired "porcelain enamel" (different from the china feel porcelain and paint feel enamel of the past) that doesn't stain and is very very hard to damage. These don't have the wonderful clay feeling of fireclay or old style porcelain. It's more of a glass feeling. But the quality is excellent.

There's another large manufacturer that makes ones that feel more like plastic and seem to be of lesser quality.

There are (last I looked) some old small makers who still make the real old style porcelain, some of whose quality is also good.

if you find an old sink you'd like for your old house it can be recoated also.

and i think someone (kohler?) makes styles like old houses had in the past.

Kohler cast iron with enamel is fine quality, and you pay for it. A broad selection of styles, shapes, colors.
Stainless is available at many price poits, quality levels and designs, so much so that it's hard to generalize.
Fireclay (which I ended up with after realizing that the copper farm sink was gonna be a bridge too far) has been great in my kitchen for 3+ years. It's proved indestructible. Mine's a Whitehaus, FWIW. Fireclay is made in fewer shapes, and just three colors AFAIK (White; linen white/biscuit; black)
Casey

wow, this group has an incredible amount of information to share.
I love the old look and feel of the old porcelain, but now I understand that the sinks are no longer made that way. The Kohler cast iron with enamel sounds good, but the Whitehaus Fireclay sounds like something I need to learn more about.

I suppose that a good quality stainless is fine for undermount.

More opinions out there?

Thanks!
Don

I agree with folks who are saying that you need to look at all the options out there. More importantly you need to TOUCH the options out there. To me a sink is a very tactile item. Something you use every day. If the feel of it bugs you, then the sink is not the right one for you. I went to several places to see and touch the sinks. I hated the stainless options right away. I love some of the versions of them..like the Kohler Stages Chef sink...but hate the feel & look of the stainless. I tried Silgranite and those just felt "plasticky" to me. I finally went to a Kohler store and saw the enameled cast iron and knew I'd found my sinks. They even had the Smart Divide option on display and I loved it right away. I made the decision to use a Kohler Cast Iron sink early on in the design process and never looked back. I also got a coordinating prep sink. I like the feel of it, the many different color options and the fact that it doesn't get all scratched or spotty looking like the stainless ones. They were more expensive than some of the stainless options but I'm really glad I spent the money. I wound up getting the Biscuit color and it blends very nicely with my light granite. I liked Cane Sugar too but it was more expensive. The Kohler store gave me little samples of the sink colors to take to the granite places....

Oh yeah, and I loved the Kohler Duostrainer as well. I about died at the price but in the end it was worth it too.

I still really liked the functionality of the Stages Chef sink so everything is a trade-off.

Good luck to you.

My Kohler cast iron sink (came with the house so I have no idea how old it is) is stained horribly. I used to be able to manage it by use bleach spray regularly but now there are yellow stains that aren't budging (entirely possible that it's from the bleach spray I was using!)

It always looks yucky unless I scrub like crazy and finish with bleach spray. Next sink I have will be stainless for sure.