How do you use your kitchen? And who uses your kitchen? Do you have small children? or maybe elderly parents living with you? Are you a messy cook or a tidy reheat take out kind of cook? Are you the kind of party entertainer that cleans right after the party catching the spilled red wine or do you wait until the morning? Do you use lots of olive oil, red wine and mustard? When we had kids I would have loved quartz in our home. My kids used our kitchen as their lab for experiments or a place to make messy pizza or sprinkled cupcakes. We were a messy active family that spilled things. You might not see the spilled food coloring immediately. We chose a dark granite in a graphite color. It was wonderful and worked for us. Fast forward to our home today. We have chosen a white delicate marble with adult kids who only come into town for the holidays. It is perfect for us and we love it. I looked into white granites but there are many that have issues that crop up later. Now that I say that Quartz has had a few complaints too. Here are some links... White Ice Granite Stained Cambria Quartz Stain Reviews on Emerstone quartz? Durability, staining, chipping, etc? New quartz counters staining Quartz and White Granite...put to the stain test

@Debbi Washburn Yes, I did see that picture (plus a few others online), so I knew what the overall veining pattern would be. But it's very hard to tell vein color from a photo online, especially one that shows a full slab or a zoomed-out full kitchen view. I was definitely expecting some grey, but I was not expecting the grey to be so dark, nor was I expecting it to dominate the gold/taupe tones.

I generally don't express this opinion because I am in the clear minority and unlike Patricia Colwell I don't feel a need to convince anyone that I'm right. And right off the bat I will have offended the many people who have chosen marble-look quartz for their kitchens. It's not personal. Your kitchens are lovely. Bear with me, though, because I'm going somewhere with this. I don't care for marble-look quartz, and I have yet to see any that I thought looked convincing (note to Lauren--I'm interested to know what products you thought looked convincing, not saying they aren't out there, just that I haven't seen them). The porcelain products look convincing. You know what else does a pretty good job of faking the pattern of marble? Laminate. It won't pass Patricia's hot pot test, and it won't pass for real marble because the edges of laminate counters always look like laminate no matter how good the pattern looks. But they create the pattern by taking a picture of real marble, so the patterns are actually quite good. Maybe laminate is too low-brow for your mom. Maybe her kitchen is so big that the pattern would have to repeat, which would undermine the effect. But maybe it will suit her needs. Wilsonart Calacatta Lincoln I thought was the most likely fit (below) but you could also look at Wilsonart Drama Marble and Anzio marble and maybe Formica Calacatta Cava. Wilsonart Calacatta Lincoln close-up Wilsonart Calacatta Lincoln full sheet view

@Project Mode yes MarketCollection,Asbury ceramic 3x9 subway tiles color is creamy-off white (called Fleece) in crackle finish.We looked at so many neutral,off-white,light beiges.I ended up going with first one the stone salesperson told me was perfect for my Taj Mahl lol. Did you go with the Mont Blanc quartzite?