Let me chime in with some info that I was told by a man I trust, whose family is Italian and has been importing stone for 40+ years. He said, categorically, that he would not laminate Calacatta because it is nearly impossible to completely hide the seam. Mostly due to the veining, but also due to the fact that over time the bonding agents almost always yellow and it is easily seen on the creamy white face of the stone.

I have seen 5cm slabs, but there were none available in Calacatta when we did our kitchen, so we went with the 3cm. I think it's mnhockeymom's kitchen that has a 5cm island.

If you do the laminated method, I think it would be in your best interest to make a bevel or some sort of a break at the point of lamination to make it less visible.

As for supporting a 5cm slab, you would need to use plywood boxes for certain and your floor may need additional support. The main area of concern of course would be any overhang or bar area.

Good luck!

someone on the forum... just within the past week or so; posted a kitchen with a 5cm slab on an island. It was spectacular. For the life of me, I can't remember the name of the poster. I also, while cyber wish shopping, was looking at slabs of Calcutta and saw 5cm ones. (OK... something is coming back to me and I think it was the Boston area). Others know way more then me but I have to ask, if 5cm is too heavy for countertops, what use do they sell it for?

Katieob has 5 cm calacatta ... absolutely stunning.

I saw some 5 cm slabs during my marble hunt around the Boston and Southern NH area, but color choices were limited and they were way out of my budget.

Erika

Here is a link that might be useful: katieob's marble

It was katieob who posted her 5cm marble. Here's the link.

She posted that the marble slab came from Marble & Granite in Westwood, MA

Here is a link that might be useful: 5 cm Marble

Yes, katieob's 5cm slab is amazingly beautiful. I think wascollete has it too (her kitchen is on the finished kitchens blog).

I doubt we will be able to find any in our area- DH went to IMC in Dallas today and walked through a 50,000 sqft warehouse full of marble and stone... but no 5cm slabs. The fabricators in our city only have a few marble slabs available at all onsite to choose from.

Hmmm- looks like I might be headed to Dallas to see the slabs in person and pick a 3cm one. Would it look funny to do the mitered edge? From underneath, you would see the different thicknesses- not sure if I'm okay with that. But I really had my heart set on a more substantial (thick) counter on the island.

Hi all.

I was very close to going with a 3 cm calacatta slab with laminated edges. I had expressed to my fabricator-I met with him to discuss what I wanted before I'd ever seen a slab-that I wanted "beefy" "chunky" "thick" (always accompanied by exaggerated hand gestures as if holding a huge cheeseburger). He was pretty confident he could give me that with the 3 cm and that it would be a quality look. I remember him mentioning being able to see the laminate from underneath?

Then we went to the slab yard and they had the 5 cm slab out for me to see. It was the only one available and we grabbed it. I have no idea about availability or if it was a stroke of luck.

As far as support for the weight, our cabinetmaker built our island specifically to support it and our framer reinforced the floor below the island.

I included a close up of our standard, eased edge if that helps. Good luck in your search!!

Katie

{{!gwi}}

Wow! I guess you do learn something new every day. Gorgeous slab Katie.

Since the epoxies seem to yellow, either mitreing the edge or choosing a laminate style with a 'break' in the seam does make sense.

Katie, I love the visual of the cheeseburger!!! That's how I have felt when trying to describe what I'm looking for to the three (that's right, just three) fabricators in town. Unfortunately, here is how the conversations have gone for me:

1) Why are you even considering marble or soapstone? Those materials are definitely not suitable for kitchens.
2) Of course we can give you a thick counter- it comes in 2cm and 3cm thicknesses and 3cm is the thicker one.
3) Can I show you some granite? That would look much better in your kitchen.

So naturally my frustration level is high. DH went to Denver on Tuesday to check out soapstone at M. Teixeira (super impressed) and then was in Dallas today to research marble. I'm sure we will end up with beautiful materials, it's just a little bit challenging since we live in the middle of Kansas.

Sounds like either standard 3cm or 5cm with a mitered edge might be the way to go. I can't imagine it would be cost-effective to find a true 5cm slab and ship much further than Denver (9 hrs) or Dallas (6 hours).

Appreciate all the comments!

vineyard put 8cm granite on her island. Her island is more like a continent and needed the chunky stone. Big chunky slabs exist. They just take quite a bit more to hunt down.

5CM is way more popular (and available) on the East Coast US than
farther inland. I have seen it done in Connecticut and other North Eastern
states.

As long as you have good solid cabinets and proper floor construction,
weight should not be an issue....

hth

kevin

I was gasping at vineyard's amazing kitchen and island linked above and then read this in the thread where she talked about the island marble. Sounds like they laminated the edge for her.

"downsy, the slab is actually 2cm so it wasn't a problem to transport. Of course, they brought in two 6 1/2' x 7' slabs for the island, so it was kind of a big ordeal due to size! But the edge is actually two layers of 2cm granite sandwiched together as a vertical lamination below the counter 2cm granite. Hope that's understandable...let me know if you need more clarification. :) "

Mereanne, I'm just curious, do you mind telling me where your husband went in Dallas? I live in Decatur which is 60 miles west, and I too have ran in to the same argument you have. "You don't want soapstone and marble in your kitchen, but we can show you some beautiful granites which look close to those." :0 It just makes me more determined! But, as far as I know, Soapstone is foreign to Dallas.

I would love to know where a large showroom is in the DFW area! But, if you had no luck, I might as well not go there!

If I DO hear or find anything in this area, I'll sure let you know! Have you looked around Oklahoma City?

You can get Vermont Danby in 5cm - it is one of their standard thickness'. IMC is a Vermont Danby dealer as listed on their website: www.vermontquarries.com. They may not stock it but you can order through them. Or just contact Vermont Quarries direct.

I'm in Boulder (so just northwest of Denver) and after seeing mnhockeymom's drool-worthy 5cm slabs knew I had to have them. Ha ha! Six+ months later and w-a-y too many hours schlepping baby, toddler and myself to every place with white marble within two hours and then on the telephone (inc. staying up late to call sites in Italy) later I truthfully felt lucky to find 3cm slabs in the variation I wanted (I wanted NO gold, only white and grey Calacatta) at CAPCO in Denver. (They have a terrific assortment, crappy customer service and high prices. One of three won me over, go figure.)

For the pantry section we needed to have a two inch (deep) ledge -- not sure what happened but the cabinetmaker left too much room for 3cm, so we used the 2cm (which we used for our backsplash) laminated for it. I thought I was clear with the countertop fabricator about it being mitered; it wasn't and the seam really shows!

At first I was pretty upset about it but truthfully it's such a minor part of our kitchen that the only way to see it is to go up close and look for it. But if I'd had that in my entire kitchen I'd be beside myself! (Clearly I'm being melodramatic, but you get the point.)

When I daydream about what I'd do differently one thing I think of is getting 2cm slabs and having the mitered edge (done correctly!) everywhere -- it would have saved some money (because those slabs were tres cher). Of course, something would've gone wrong because something always does, so the money I saved would've been money I had to use on therapy and chocolate (and then bigger clothes).

There was someone here who had her island top mitered beautifully -- I mean such care was taken by her fabricator to ensure the seaming was flawless (and it appeared so). Yum. It can be done, and it can be done well -- just stay on top of your fabricator!

Good luck and happy marble!

what does a mitered edge on stone look like?

Susied3, he went to IMC stone in Dallas. It was located really close to DFW. They had tons of granite and marble in stock, but no soapstone. I believe Dorado Soapstone has a location in Austin that services the Dallas area, so you might want to check them out. I think M. Teixeira might have a warehouse in Houston, so that could be an option too...

Mahlgold, I saw a mitered marble counter here in Wichita and it looked very nice, with no obvious seam. The only thing that doesn't make it look solid is that the veining doesn't go around the corner. My worry, though, is the differing thickness as seen (and felt) from underneath.

The mitered edges I've seen create an overhang like this:

I am going through the same dilemma on the thickness of my counter. But I unearthed some extremely valuable information, that even some of the fabricators are not aware of. TENAX, the leading maker of supplies for stone fabricators, has just launched an epoxy adhesive product within the past 6 months that is guaranteed not to yellow for 15 years! It dries clear eliminating the need to match stone colors, and was especially made to eliminate the problem of yellowing and bleeding into white stones like Calacatta. So you get an invisible seam that won't yellow, and, it won't stain either.It is called GLAXS.

So I am doing a mitered picture frame top on my Calacatta marble island, and it hopefully will be gorgeous.

Still on the fence as to whether to build up my counters to 5cam thickness because my kitchen has its original 1926 cabinetry and I'm afraid it may be overkill. Decision will be made today, so stay tuned. Check out the Glaxs product by TENAX. Go to YouTube and there is a great video that demonstrates the product. You will be sold!