Our fireclay apron sink has been indestructible, and we do a lot of clumsy swinging of cast-iron skillets. Others, however, have not been so fortunate with their fireclay, so perhaps it's a model/brand/size issue (I've got the 30" Whitehaus model). Copper's great but it will speckle and patina over time and some folks strongly dislike that aspect of it. Porcelain over cast-iron is wonderful, but it can chip. Silgranite seems pretty durable but being a rather new material, the word is not yet in on how stain-resistant it is over the years, and some object to its plasticky feel. Stainless steel is probably as indestructible as it comes.

I'm not sure I'm really going for a "farmhouse" look, necessarily. I'm just trying keep the remodeled kitchen from looking out of place in our 1870s home. We live in a small village outside of a small city in the Northeast. The kitchen was definitely an addition at some point, not sure when. The existing cabs are from the 1950s. The house is very simple...no fancy moldings or baseboards and it was added on to throughout the years. I doubt it was ever a farmhouse...I guess I'm justing trying to go for a simple, country vibe. I'm probably over-thinking the sink thing. I really like the apron front because I think it's more ergonomic and the stainless for ease of use, so as long as they don't push my cabinet budget up, I think I'm going to go for it. jgopp, The stools were something I just loved, and figure I can take with me. They're definitely not farmhouse. I figure they'll be my "bling" in an otherwise simple kitchen. :) I've had them for 2 years, and even with little girls, they are holding up well....no splinters. I do need to tie in the weathered wood somewhere, so I think I'm going to try to replicate it with the upper shelf I'm planning on one wall. Thanks for all the comments! I'll likely be posting more questions over the next couple of weeks as I try to pin down choices.

Sophie: At 6:13, you may watch Kohler install their 3942 into a plastic laminate countertop. If tizzyp needed new laminate tops, she could get a Karran Edge series undermount.

FWIW I found a shot that gives a good idea of what a living patina sink looks like - it's virtually maintenance free. I did NOT wanted a hammered bottom on my sink because I thought it would be problematic for cleaning and in when looking at sinks, most of the hammered sinks were of poor quality and looked artificial and obnoxious. I did opt for a hammered front because I thought the bottom of my sink and the front would be exposed to different things and the hammered front would better disguise any discrepancy. Also the way in which Havens actually "hammers" the apron is very subtle and not the busy obnoxious look that most of them have. I do have a relatively inexpensive hammered copper sink in my guest bath because I am not concerned about maintenance in that room since it is used almost never :-). It is from Premiere Copper which is a great source for copper stuff. They supplied my copper hood as well as copper accent tiles. They also did a custom copper medallion - my designer sketched it out using an Art Nouveau statue of a crane that I have and we both love. I also have a copper ceiling. My old kitchen had the standard dropped plastic sheets covering fluorescent tubes and my new lighting now has lots of canned lights - under cabinet task lights. However, I have structural soffits so my designer used the higher space in the middle to create a dramatic coved copper tiled ceiling with uplighting. Here's a pretty good shot of the sink when it was installed. It pretty much still looks like this with some shiny patches that fairly quickly change. Copper medallion with crane and copper hood Front of my apron sink which has the very subtle hammered treatment Terrible photo of the coved ceiling :-)