@nadianyc - Thanks, the kitchen is not done yet, hence no "reveal" thread. The vent hood is by Prestige. It comes highly recommended from the Appliances forum and moves a crazy amount of air. I bought it from AJ Madison - it's an insert. They have two versions - one where the fans are installed on the vent hood and another where they are installed in line with the ducting. The second version is much quieter but I've had bad luck with fans installed in a hot place (attic) so I went with the regular model instead. If you want the cabinets to be completely flat on the front as ours are you need to either bump the uppers outward or make them deeper than normal because the depth of the insert is 14-15 inches if I remember correctly. I bought the tiles at a local distributor (Palmetto Tile Distributors) but they are readily available online, even on Ebay with free shipping.

http://ths.gardenweb.com/discussions/2275194/tiny-bathroom-bianco-carrara-porcelain-tile?n=18 eld6161, Here is my old post on using a marble-look porcelain tile. I worked with my installer. We laid out the varied tile patterns and tried to make sure the ones that were the same were not placed beside each other. I still love my bathroom "marble" tile. Good luck with your project!

nuppal- Those tiles do look pretty good from the picture. If the tiles were all flat like that, lippage can still occur if the walls aren't really flat. They often look flat, but, if you lay, say, a 6' straight edge against them you can see bows due to the studs not being perfect. If the tile setter is particular, he adds thin shims to the studs before the backer board goes on so that it lies perfectly flat. My tile guy last time was a fanatic and would not accept even 1/32" of deviation. Varying the amount of thin set behind the tiles can compensate for slightly non-flat walls, but it makes it a lot harder to get a good result. I can't say whether this is a non-flat wall issue or just the fact that the tile setter is not perfect, or both. Please update when you meet with the tile guy and let us know what he has to say. Good luck.

I cannot address the install question but we have a similar tile in our shower, and we really like it. 3+ years of shopping tile and this is the only one hubs liked. I was apprehensive for the reasons mentioned above but it has not been a problem. It hasn't been difficult to keep clean and only one of us actually squeegees. No one in our house can be bothered to wipe with a towel, lol. Our mastiff gets bathed in it once a week (he has terrible allergies). The shower gets cleaned afterwards w/ a soft sponge and mild dish soap. It only takes a few minutes. No mildew, etc. I agree that you will not like a darker grout. We matched to the tile and it just disappears. You won't lose any of the handmade effect of the tile by matching the grout. Up close our grout varies in thickness due to the nature of the tile edge. Good luck with your project!