I don't have one of the colors you mentioned, but I do have photos: I LOVE our counters. They are LivingStone brand, which is virtually the same as Corian. The integrated sink is Corian brand. We are a young family w/4 year old and one on the way. I don't have time/patience for counter maintenance; DH and I both work outside the home and we do most of our own cooking. I wanted a light color with a matte finish. I didn't want laminate (too many bad experiences w/seams lifting etc). I didn't want to deal with keeping sink caulk clean. I didn't want something that would shatter dishes as I am a klutz--now that we have an unforgiving tile floor, I am especially glad we considered this b/c I have knocked many things against the counter in the course of working in the kitchen (and they are still intact, vs the tile where everything explodes into a million specks). An additional plus--our counters actually let some light thru, so the few base cabs we have (as opposed to drawers) are easier to see into. I can understand the appeal of natural stone and I agree it has depth/beauty that "plastic" doesn't capture; we looked at it, but in the end LivingStone was a better choice for us, financially as well as daily life. I embraced the choice of doing what worked best for me, not what is most popular. Our neighborhood is mostly starter homes, and few of the 1970s kitchens have even been updated. We not only updated but completely changed/improved the layout, which I think will have more impact for resale than natural stone counters. Secondly, we don't know when we might have an opportunity to "upgrade" so doing what works for us was the best choice. We've had our new kitchen/counters/sink about 1 1/2 years and I have had zero problems. The one "stain" I got was from an orange piece of junk mail paper where water was on the counter and the paper was left in the puddle for a few days and allowed to dry. Bleach took it right out.

Watboy, that is almost two thousand a foot, way too high unless it is Habersam. Find a local customer cabinetmaker in the phone book, preferably one that also does countertops of all kinds. That way there is no finger pointing on issues. Kitchen dealers are ordering factory cabinets and marking them up, they have to to cover their services. For some people, a designer is the way to go, we refer people to designers from time to time rather than doing their work. Big box stores are using guys like me and again marking up their work, or getting it at a low margin. Regardless, a custom shop will build you better cabinets and get them done quicker. Find one that also installs, again, no finger pointing. Expect prices to start around $300 per foot installed for some pretty basic cabinets. If you want Kraft maid quality, expect $400 to $500 per foot (those are some really nice cabinets in that price range). If you want Habersham type work, expect closer to $1,000 per foot, with about one third going into the finishing process. Solid surface, Corian is only one brand, runs from the high twenties to the mid seventies per square foot, installed. Any edge that can be polished with a machine should be no extra charge. If hand work is needed for ogee edges or the like, expect five or six bucks a linear foot. Sink and cooktop cutouts should be free, expect sinks to run from $275 to $500 depending on brand. There are some brands of solid surface to avoid. Bad material, bad warranty response on problems, or a history of bankruptcies by the parent company. Ask the fabricators which brands they sell, and which brands are kept hidden inside a cabinet somewhere. Samsung is an excellent brand, as is the LivingStone that others mentioned. Solid surface sinks don't stain, if they do that is a warranty issue. Most likely the fabricator switched a cheap china sink for the manufacturers good sink. An unscruplous fabricator can pocket a few hundred bucks on a job doing that. Yes, there are different finishes or polishes on solid surface. Matt finish is the best for durability, 60 micron sandpaper then a scotchbrite buffing. Satin is 60 micron, 30 micron, then scotchbrite buffing. Satin brings out the darker colors in a sheet. Gloss finish usually is not recomended for kitchens unless you are willing to put up with tiny scuffs when viewed in the right light. There is an exception, 100% polyester solid surfaces that can be sold high gloss. Still, a perfectionist won't be satisfied, but neither will they be happy with granite with its natural flaws. Light colors show abuse less, dark colors are a big no no cause like a black car, they show every little ding and scratch. Scratching, well we have a couple of tops that were pulled out under warranty after 9 1/2 years in a home, one bad sink. They look like new, but it was a neutral color. In about eight years of fabrication of solid surface tops, we have had seven calls to fix a scratch, and we don't charge for the service. It is a really rare occasion, a coffe mug with an abrasive bottom or a plumbers metal tool box are the usual culprits. We tell people to take a sheet of 220 grit sand paper, tape it down, and wiggle their ceramic ware back and forth several times. Problem solved. So, like other materials, solid surface isn't a perfect material for a countertop, but there are fewer complaints from customers than the other materials. In my opinion, it is the best material available as long as you don't pick a black, dark green or dark blue. It is 100% non porous, uses FDA approved materials, has a NSF51 rating for countertop use, sinks can be intergrated with no seams or cauling needed, shouldn't be a charge for cutouts or common bullnose edges, the horizontal seams should be nearly invisible, you can make backsplashes that match or even window sills, it is available in half sheets (15 square feet) which means less waste and thus less cost, it is pretty consistent so no need to visit a slab yard or worry that someone will cut out the pretty part, it can be bleached for sanitation with no harm, common cleaning products won't hurt it, and no matter what is done to it, it can be repaired almost invisibly. No sealing needed, ever. And long warranties that truly mean what they say because the fabricators must be certified to purchase the material. The best thing is that solid surface shops aren't used to the material having flaws that can be blamed "Oh, it is a natural product you know, it is all like that". We tend to be perfectionists and the material is light enough to handle that it can be taken out and scribed if needed. Rodding isn't needed so rod splits don't happen, it doesn't stain or etch but if it did, just sand it out and repolish. Bacteria can't survive on it for long, no crevices, cracks, fissues, pores, pits or caulk seams for them to hide in. The acrylic brands and some of the polyester products are UV stable so no fading like quartz or some granites. It is produced in factories, no child labor involved, no mountains ripped apart, no bonded labor used. No suprises in the chemical content like granite, no radiation, no radon, no cobalt 60, no Polenium, no arsneic or lead or other heavy metals. Uranium can't leach out because there is none to start with. You know who makes it and who will stand behind it, the brand not the fabricator. Everyone who knows me knows I can go on and on on the benefits of solid surface. It isn't as pretty nor as hard as quartz or granite, but it is a safe investment and workers don't develop silicosis working with it and I've never heard of a fabricator getting killed from a sheet of it falling on them. Then after years of service, you buff it up and it looks like brand new. No other material can offer that. No one uses coasters on solid surface, but if that coffee mug will scratch or stain solid surface, it will likely do the same to granite or quartz. Go over to findstone.com and read thousands of granite customers customer complaints, read the dozens of problems here on Garden Web on granite issues, there is no other material that has as many complaints. Less than 30% of the market, with 90% of the complaints. I'll sell it to you and make a good profit. I'll test it first to make darned sure it is a low radiation level stone first. You will like the quality of my seams, installation, and polishing, but when it cracks, stains, or etches, I'll say I told you so. It is just a stone, it came out of the earths crust. Understand that and you will love the stuff. Just my opinion

I really like having our island one level and making it two level to avoid a seam wouldn't have been an acceptable compromise to me. Perhaps because I'm short, I find it more comfortable to sit at a counter height island and I would feel too cut-off from seeing the rest of the room by a raised bar while cooking. Also, I'm not sure I understand your layout, but I think you said that the seating area was the 72" side (the one that doesn't connect to the right angle corner. If you made it raised, it seems like you could just be making the problem of reaching the center harder. It would take a long reach to reach the lower counter from the side with the raised counter so whatever was lower would have to be cleaned from the lower edges. I'm also not clear on where the cabinets are under the island. Depending on what cabinets you ordered, perhaps they could be arranged in a different configuration if you wanted. I'm not saying that's what you should do but if it is what you wanted to do, changing your mind now doesn't necessarily mean that the cabinets would have to be wasted. When we thought we couldn't get large enough slabs of the granite we wanted to do our island with one, we did decide it would be fine with a seam. A good fabricator can do excellent seams. Usually the granite slabs are book matched. Granite slabs are successive slices of a block of granite. "Book matched" means they alternate which side of the granite they polish so that for two successive slabs, the sides that touched each other in the block were polished. Therefore the grain on one will be an almost perfect mirror image of the grain on the other. They can layout the pieces for each side of the seam on the two slabs so that there is a grain match at the seam. If they can do a tight seam, it can almost disappear and the result can look very good. I'm glad that we were able to find big enough slabs to not need a seam. But the seam with book matched slabs would have been my second choice.

SJ-- very nice! I suspect you may be the exception, not the rule, however. Width may limit you as well. xtacie--thanks for the kind words! We have the final inspection tomorrow, so fingers crossed I'll be unpacking boxes back in the house by this weekend. And of course I will snap some photos for a GW reveal.... Indeed, I did have to go with the pony wall. Would not work any other way with the plumbing and electrical and local building codes. This totally screwed up the cover on the end of the island because the width of the island now exceeded that of the cover panel I was going to use. I ended up waterfalling the Corian on both ends of the island to solve it easily. I originally had a set of cabinets facing out into the LR on the back of the island, but realized during install the island would be far too big with these and the overhang so I deleted them and had to figure how to cover the pony wall. I considered a number of different options, including "backpainted glass" someone on this site turned me on to but in the end I decided to drywall it and paint it a color that matched the backsplash. It turned out very bold, but if I don't like it someday I can just paint it white or something. Drywalling it gave me the most options later. Anyway, enough rambling about me on housebuilder14's countertop thread... :)