One thing to look for is how the tile looks with the lights on and lights off. I tried the MOP shell tile in my current kitchen. It was gorgeous with the lights off and only daylight in the room. As soon as I turned on the ucl or the other lights, it went flat. Someone else mentioned this. I was surprised that it happened. I think Ann Sachs might have an Onyx tile available.

Thanks for the input. I lean toward the Raven and Calacatta, too. (In fact we just told our contractor to put the order in for the countertop). I'm still not 100% sold on the marble tile, though, I originally wanted a carrera that would be more muted, but the tile shop we're using doesn't have anything that looks right with Raven. I just worry that the Calacatta is SO white. When I see kitchens like this: http://bungalowhomeinteriors.blogspot.com/2012/04/clients-home.html my eye is drawn to how cool the tile looks next to the cabinetry. Guess I'm also concerned that the calacatta has more movement in it, which could be distracting. I'm loving the look of this kitchen (also with Raven), but I don't know what the tile is: https://www.houzz.com/photos/south-pasadena-craftsman-traditional-kitchen-los-angeles-phvw-vp~14622889-Pasadena-Craftsman-traditional-kitchen-los-angeles Does anyone regret getting marble backsplash?

If you have trouble visualizing what you'd like but "know it when you see it", then at this stage you should probably just look at as many stainless / dark cherry kitchens as you can and see which countertops and flooring "grab" you. In my case I knew I wanted simple, natural cherry cabinets and stainless appliances and probably a wood floor, but that was it. Looking at lots of pictures helped me narrow things down, so now I can at least have intelligent conversations with kitchen designers. I'd suggest going over to houzz.com and entering "stainless steel dark cherry kitchen" into their search box and looking through some of the hundreds of results you get. It's a great source of ideas. After you see some you like, you can probably come up with more words to add to the search box to narrow things down. You can also go to google and enter "site:gardenweb.com dark cherry stainless" and you'll find lots of threads on this site too. I don't know of a way to limit it to threads with photos, unfortunately. Laura

Get a sample of your cabinet doors, and then bring it to visit the samples of counters in your favorite show room. Nobody can guess.