The way you describe your kitchen, it sounds just like mine. I just agonized over the backsplash, and finally decided on Oceanside Glasstile, Geologie series, in Sandstone color, 1x2 offset brick pattern. It is a glass and slate combination. The runner up was a falling water honed slate by Stone & Pewter accents in the "Prairie" color. Tan Brown granite is going to look great. We went with Tropical Brown, but Tan Brown was a top choice too.

Hi FooDee. Your granite is really gorgeous! Do you have some sample tiles you could stand up against the wall and take some pics of? I don't know about most people, but that makes a difference for me in commenting on a request for backsplash help. Here goes my two pennies...I don't like to use a different stone for a backsplash than the countertops. In fact, the only time I like a stone splash is when it's marble. I usually prefer a ceramic, porcelain, what-have-you, man-made tile. But that's just me. If that were my beautiful granite, I wouldn't want anything with a pattern or wild color to distract from it. Could you try some tiles that pull out the vanilla-y, caramel-y tones from the counter? Nothing tumbled because you've got that going on the floor already and your granite reads much more chic than that. Oh, and you mentioned beige. There are LOTS of shades of beige out there. Don't dismiss them. Go to a few tile stores and get some samples. Then show us. We love to vote on bs tiles! :)

You could, but it's a checkerboard for lack of a better word... I don't see it in your space at all. Your kitchen floor/cabinets are warm, your counter is cool even though beautiful. You don't need grout, "jumping" out from the tile.... "popping" out from the tile color. Too busy in my opinion for what I think you want. Herringbone in that size would take a TON of cuts and you would need a person to install that is STELLAR and well versed in doing herringbone with such a large tile. You may want to look for, "herringbone" there is a lot at tile bar. Not going to be as large in scale though. Given the width of the space between your counters and cupboards that size would be a ton of waste going with 12" even if you found a stellar well versed tile person. If you lean herringbone you might look at their samples at tile bar or even a chevron which is not to terribly different. Not just tile bar, but fire clay is another site or Zanger. This is from the Zanger website... it's chevron. Remember, your cupboards and floors are warm and you chose a cool tone counter. I don't know their sample program at Zanger as well. http://www.walkerzanger.com/collections/products.php?view=style&mat=Zen&coll=Shift

Agree about herringbone..I'd go for narrower tile if that possible in order to do herringbone, if no-I'd stick with offset. It's also hard to predict who'll be the tilers..some are very good, some are not as good as others. Takes some skill, as mentioned upthread. But as backsplash comes last you'll know much more and you'll have time to decide. Do you have samples of everything you showed? any possibilty for you to put them in the order they's be installed? Granite, flooring-horizontal..tile, door sample-vertical. You'll get better idea on how will look irl, because surfaces tend to read differently when light hits them at a different angle. If you did that already-great.. if you can make a photo for us-even better. how large is the kitchen, what's the layout, will it get enough light, is it open, semi-open? What the space/s next to it will be? All this would influence my choice of combinations of colors. All yours supposedly work well together, but the context is important. And I miss it a bit, because I don't know the space you're working with. As for the painted cabinets I find them all high maintenance , at least every time it's not me who's cooking, regardless their color(I have a light taupe. Because I like taupe. Btw I like purple too so it was a tough decision)) Then it's not like I'd love every wood stain out there too, so.. To me, that'd be a lot of cool, darker gray, but colors are personal, and do depend on a context which I lack as of now. Also one can add interesting hardware(depending on whar direction kitchen takes), colorful accessories and many other things. If you have linen door sample at home I'd try it with the granite sample too (in the order they'd be installed). Not because it's more timeless or whatever, but because you might see it doesn't work(for example too creamy next to the granite..hard to see the color on the screen)-or on the opposite, you might like it more than gray. With this specific granite. In short if you can try and stagger the samples together and look at them in different lghts (morning, afternoon, artificial if possible..yes, I know it's a new house, we brought a flashlight with us, at some point, electricity wasn't there yet, to look at the colors at night) ..it's worth the time and effort.