There's a lot of threads here on Corian, Swanstone, solid surface, and cultured marble/granite. You'll pull up a lot of info if you do a search.

I did my shower in my last house with solid surface. No grout, easy to clean, looked great. I'd do it again.

We built a custom home in 1997 and all the surrounds are plain white Corian. I will never install a tiled shower in a home - too many possibilities for failure, too hard to keep clean, and tile goes out of fashion very quickly and then it is glaringly dated. My surrounds look as good today as they did the day they were installed and are EASY to maintain. I just re-caulked them last year for the first time. I simply make the artistic focal point of the room something other than the shower. I've had the tiled shower and shower pan, and I will NEVER willingly choose that again. More tiled showers are secretly rotting the house structure underneath/behind them than not, out there. Ask any GOOD contractor. Moisture hidden in the house structure not only rots your structure, it also grows mold and allows termites to thrive (they need humidity which is why they live underground and make mud tunnels into structures).

speaktodeek, would you have a picture of that shower you might share? Would love to see it.

This gives the basic idea. This is a picture taken during the re-caulking process last year. I used a caulk loosener then covered the wetted joint in plastic wrap to aid the process. So ignore that part. But you can see the very plain, white look that will never be dated and will never require huge amounts of maintenance and cleaning!!

Thanks. Very clean look. I've seen granite used -- one in rainforest was amazing -- but not sure of the practicality.

Is the floor a solid piece of Corian too? Does that get slippery? Are there ways to treat a solid surface shower floor to make it less slippery?

And, what would you expect the Corian to cost today for that size shower? Thanks.

When custom corian bases are used , they are built up out of thinner material and then shaved down to add the requisite slope to the drain. Grooves (coves) are added to provide some grip because corian can get slippery. Think of them like grout joints.

My house was built in the late 60s -- built with everything that was "it" at the time. The walk-in shower in my bathroom is walled with cultured marble and the hall bath originally was a tub with cultured marble above. My thoughts on it:

- True, it doesn't have grout lines, but it does still get soap scum and -- if not attended to regularly -- mold on the solid sheets.

- It is very plain to look at. When I had the hall bath tub redone, I went with tile and am happier with it; I like the look better, and it's not really any more difficult to keep clean.

- Neither of my bathrooms has anything in the way of shelves or niches to hold shampoo and soap. I don't know if that was an oversight or if such things can't be done on solid pieces.

We're just in the process of planning a main bathroom gut and reno. We decided solid surface in the tub/shower and on the wall behind the toilet and backsplash at the sink would be our preference. We found a gorgeous piece of granite for the vanity so then wanted something to go well with it and the cabinets. Our choice was a pattern in Caesarstone quartz. You can get 1 cm, 2 cm or 3 cm, so for our purpose 1 cm would be ideal. However we will need deep pockets if we go this route. Our first quote for the Caesarstone alone (close to 2 slabs required) is between $6,000 and $7,000 installed, hopefully closer to the lower end of that. My heart fell as we had everything co-ordinated. We are getting a 2nd quote on Caesarstone and some Cambria which is less expensive if we can find a colour we like. The Caesarstone comes from Israel so it is more expensive because of the shipping costs. If we were hiring a tile setter to do tile (if we chose that route) I'm not sure what we would pay, but it would be a few thousand dollars for sure. But we would do it ourselves, as we have tiled a lot in our home. So our labour is free. It makes it a lot harder to justify spending so much on the solid surface we chose. Still trying to see what we can do for a better price. We are going to see Flo Form this week thru the Costco program. saves a few dollars. The quartz can be cut for openings to have niches on the shower walls and of course for the holes required to fit shower controls, faucets etc. It would be templated, just like a countertop is.

"So our labour is free. It makes it a lot harder to justify spending so much on the solid surface"

It's not exactly free. More accurate to say that it's not costing you cash out of pocket. We all make your same choice on goods and services everyday.

Do you bake your own bread ? Why not ? it's easy and the ingredients are pretty cheap. Change your own oil in your car or truck? You could do that in twenty minutes or less and almost certainly do a better job than the young techs that get the job at wherever you go to get it done now. What about making your own clothes ? Jo-Ann's sells fabric and thread cheap and you could pick up a sewing machine on craigslist for next to nothing.

Bet ya don't and you could do all of them easily. Home improvement isn't really any different. The skills are quite comparable to the above trades and I doubt anyone sweats the price they pay for bread which is gone in a week , or pants that last two-three years. Yet, we'll live with and use that shower everyday for 10-20 years . Sometimes twice a day. And , that' typically for a quick 4x4 tiled shower and often a receptor base.

When we start talking about single slabs of material for walls and that material is 10x more expensive than the standard - don't you think the labor to deal with such by a professional is going to be a lot more $$$ than what you could DIY it for ???

Now I'm not knocking DIY , but many of the ideas on I hear round here about what things should cost amaze me.

"Is the floor a solid piece of Corian too? Does that get slippery? Are there ways to treat a solid surface shower floor to make it less slippery?

And, what would you expect the Corian to cost today for that size shower?

The floor can be solid Corian; most are thermoformed standard 1/2" thickness. Corian had a floor tile once and Tony Bascillio, DuPont's trainer, told us that Corian is actually less slippery when wet than dry. I haven't looked up Corian's coeffiecient of friction wet and dry to substantiate his claim.

I don't know to what size shower you are referring, but solid surface can be installed competitively with tile when the entirety of the job is considered.

By the way, quartz surfacing meets the definition of solid surface.

Xedos, Yes to all of the above in your comment. I do in fact bake my own bread and with home ground wheat. My husband changes our oil and other maintenance issues with the car. I have sewn many of my own clothes in the past although not so much these days. And I knit many sweaters, socks, scarves, etc. for myself and others. We have done much of our own home reno's and maintenance and have landscaped and maintain a large yard. We have tiled our entire house floor as well as kitchen backsplash and 1 bathroom shower and walls. I could go on but you should get my point I think.

I am not suggesting that the costs for the quartz or other things are unreasonable, just that I didn't know and was surprised since it puts us well over budget. We either have to go back to the idea of doing our own labour and using tile which is free to us compared to paying for pros to do something we aren't equipped to do. Or we have to cash out retirement savings to come up with the extra funds. Our problem, no-one else's. I was just providing some feedback and what we found for approximate costs to do the solid surface, since the thread was about solid surface versus tile walls.

Silken, that's all great, and I wasn't looking to poke fun at you or anyone else. I've done all of those tasks myself too, including the oil.

My aim was to get people to think about the economics of all this. Most people don't have the time or the skill to do those things , and many who do don't want to. It's the reason pretty much everyone has jobs.

The second thing was supply and demand. Tile for showers is ubiquitous , sheet goods in 1cm thickness , not so much. And, the market for it is small too. That should tell you right away it'll carry a premimum price.

I have swanstone in my boys bathroom. Itis Tahiti Sand in color. It never looks dirty and I know they do not clean as well as they should. Spray and wipe. No grout lines and no mold issues. Yes, tile looks much prettier, but i have had tile around a tub before and never again, The Swanstone solid surface was not cheap, but it really is a maintenance dream. I am having a bathroom put in on my first floor and am looking at another swanstone enclosure as well as the swanstone floor. Low maintenance and looks good.

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