Kayl - my old kitchen had blue formica as well - must have been the "it" choice in the 80's :) Your kitchen has a great layout. Hausfrau's kitchen is warm and stunning, with a mission feel. Your oak cabinets seem to have a similar tone as hers. If it is the warmth with the light/gold counters you want to recreate, I can't imagine you would have a problem.

The darker counters can look great with the oak as well. I think your only limitation right now is deciding which you want (and possibly budget depending on what stone you want.)

Before they cut the stone call them to wait and check out other options. Bring some sample of your wood color with you to the stone yard. You may stick with the Uba, but this way you will know you exhausted the other option.

What colors are the rest of your house? If this would be the only beige, it may not flow very well (your white trim makes me wonder). Or, it could be the start of needing to do a bunch over to not have the kitchen stick out.

If that is not an issue, I would try to slow down a little and really give yourself time to process the change. Sometimes your original instinct will be the right one for you and other times, the new idea is an "ah-ha" moment and that is the right one.

I don't think either look is wrong, it will be about which is more right for you personally...

Exterior is southern plantation style. Front of house is formal dining, living room & entry with tall white baseboards & crown moulding, dark cherry tables, antique oak claw foot dining table & sideboard, middle of house is a soon to be completed library, the dinette & the kitchen. Back of house is more casual with all white sunroom and great room with oak flooring, tall baseboards & trim stained that mission reddish oak color, vaulted ceilings, exposed beams with one wall all windows. So we start out formal in the front and get more casual as you walk back into the house. Dining room is golds, creams & burgundy, great room Gold and crimson. Living room is going to evolve; not sure what colors there. Library & sun are neutral using only the plants and books for color.

My floors must, alas, remain the same. They go all over the main floor with a few exceptions. I've made peace with them finally! I just don't know how the "hausfrau" look would look with my all white trim & light floors. Too washed out? Is it too similar in coloring to the rest of the house? i orignially was drawn to the Uba Tuba because of the depth of the stone and the contract with the oak. It also was subtle and did not fight the graining in the oak.

I personally prefer more contrast, which you would get with Uba Tuba. It is one of my all-time favorite granites. Lady's Dream is nice but more muted. I just saw a model home this weekend with nice slabs of Lady's Dream. It is subtle and elegant. So any of those options will look beautiful. Perhaps you can bring home some samples of each to see how the light of your kitchen works with each and if it helps you make a decision. That's what I did - got about 5 samples and lived with them a couple of weeks before making a decision.

IMO, with everything in the kitchen being relatively monochromatic, the Uba Tuba would be perfect (or any other bold granite).

There are a lot of darker touches in that other kitchen, which your kitchen does not have. See the ceiling, space between the cabinet tops and ceiling, hardware, etc. I think a creamy granite in you rkitchen is going to be TOO monochromatic, especially in an oak kitchen (e.g. not modern/intentionally monochromatic).

I love UbaTuba
But.....
after seeing HausFrau... I could not agree with you more
that it looks beatiful.
If it were me, I would choose the beige cream granite.

~boxerpups

Hi kayl...

I like the look of the creamy granite...and I think it would go very well in your kitchen.

Good luck with your remodel!

KA:)

Uba tuba looks great with a lighter oak. The other granite is nice also but there would be more of a dramatic contrast with the uba tuba. Have fun and go with your gut/heart-they're both nice granites so you really can't go wrong!!

**UPDATE** I put a hold on my granite order & went back out to the granite yard. Brought home loads of samples & decided that I just couldn't pull off a lighter granite with my light tile floors. They looked nice, but they just didn't "pop".

Thankfully a good friend went along and encouraged some darker samples including the sample of her counters - lab green. Here's a picture of the three top choices - my uba tuba is still there, along with the yard's lab green and friends lab green. Her lab green is on the left - much darker with more gold than the sample from the yard. In the middle is the yard's lab green. On the right is uba tuba. I'm now thinking that there is too much gold in the uba tuba and that it looks too busy. How do people ever make decisions?? My DD likes the dark one, I had originally ordered the right one and DH still "loves" the blue laminate (he'd rather put the money into a new home for his sports car).

I would greatly appreciate your input! Please vote on your favorite and tell me why. Thanks!

{{!gwi}}

{{!gwi}}

I don't think you can go wrong with any of the three there. You're DH's opinion doesn't count since he loves the blue laminate ;) (which I thought was purple in the 1st photo! egads!)

I vote Uba Tube because of the gold in it. I think it pulls together with your cabinets nicely but you can't go wrong with any of these.

Kayl - There is no wrong answer to this question, but I will share what I am thinking.

When I see them all side by side, the uba tuba goes to the bottom of my list because it seems so gold against the others and the dark on goes to the top because it stands out in contrast to the others. But - I don't think you should pick out in contrast to each other but in terms of what each one plays with the rest of the kitchen. I think you can make the best judgment when you look at each independently.

So while covering each up and looking at them one at a time, I am focusing on the Labrador green because on my monitor it has a gray undertone that looks lovely with the floors (which I know you were concerned about.) The Uba reads gold and the dark one makes the grout of the floor stand out to me, not the tile itself.

So (1) Labrador (2) Uba (3) Dark Labrador - but honestly I think they would all work. Because of these subtle difference try to bring your cabinet and a sample of your tile (or a paint chip that matches your tile), and a paint chip of your walls to the fabricator to pick out your actual slab to be sure you are getting what you are looking for (or maybe even something better than the samples.)

sparklekitty, you read my mind, as I was thinking the uba tuba looked too gold. Just looking at the granite itself I like the dark lab green best, but your comment about that pulling out the dark grout makes alot of sense. I am going to have the floors professionally cleaned so hopefully that grout will lighten a little. The lab green you chose as #1 does have alot of gray in it, which I suppose would also go well with the SS appliances. I only wonder if it has enough gold to blend with the cabinets.

marcydc, purple countertops? Oh my! That is my favorite color, but I will never choose a a bright color in a semi-permanent thing again after living with these countertops for 20 years! I did receive picture of a kitchen with all bright purple cabinets by e-mail from a friend recently. You would have to have a personality larger than life to pull that kitchen off!

Thanks for all of your comments. I'll post the finished product if I ever figure it out, which had better happen soon as my carpenter comes the end of the month.

I just like the darker lab better. I think the grout on the floor is the same either way and it is because you put the dark one closer to it, that it only seems to make it more noticeable.
Just make sure you use a different valance or no valance once you make the switch!

I prefer the Lab green, then the dark lab. Uba Tuba would be the last choice because I feel it has too much gold in it as well. They all would be beautiful however! Good Luck!