Kitchen Progress - Quartz worktops installed

The quartz 'Silestone - Lyra' has been installed and has really completed the look of our kitchen.

It's finally getting there and we're looking forward to the final touches being finished to complete our long awaited new kitchen!!

Under mount sink with drainer grooves and quartz windowsill.

Large central island with hob cut out.

Outer side of island has an extra shallow depth unit for extra storage.

Kitchen island with hole cut out for the pop up sockets & USB connection.

The centre island with quartz worktop overhang on the outer side & end which will be the seating area.

Quartz worktop with under mount sink and drainer grooves.

There are quartz up stands and windowsill.

Drop down end panels in quartz have been installed on the end of the

island & units.

The 'Lamon's corner unit pullout mechanism is very impressive..

The drop down ceiling edges have been made, ready to be plastered

and finished.

The electricians will be in on Monday to finish off the electrical's & lighting.

The NEFF Induction Hob has now been installed & connected into the

kitchen island.

It looks great and we were able to cook in our new kitchen for the

first time last night!! #exciting

An alternative to Marble 'Bianco Carrara'...

With my 'Dream Kitchen' in mind (below), I set out to research kitchen worktops.

I love this white worktop with the grain/vein effect. 

We knew we wanted something like this in some kind of stone whether it be granite or quartz or possibly corian.

After viewing lots of samples & visiting several showrooms, we decided that we weren't that keen on the look of corian as it was just solid colours & could also be damaged easily by heat (although easily repairable) therefore we focused on granite & quartz.

We were advised that quartz & granite were both very durable.

The advantage with Quartz being that it is non porous, upon looking at many samples the quartz was more appealing to us as the granite was very heavy looking.

Looking through my 'KITCHEN IDEAS' board on Pinterest it seemed that every photo had a Marble 'Bianco Carrara' worktop (example below).

I love the unique look of Bianco Carrara with the strong grey vein running though the white marble, so striking, yet so classic.

The only problem is that marble is very porous, suitable for bathrooms but not so ideal in the kitchen.

Therefore I had to find a quartz alternative that had the same look (easier said than done).

The options I looked at were mainly from brands that UK stone suppliers stocked being 'Silestone',  Ceasarstone, Okite - here are some of those examples:

Silestone - Bianco Rivers

Silestone - Helix

Both above options  were nice alternatives but quite subtle and very uniformed in their design. I was looking for something with more impact (considering the price we are going to have to pay, I want WOW)..

Okite - Bianco Carrara

The name says it all, they've really tried to recreate the effect of Marble Bianco Carrara.

This is a great alternative but I found this design to be too random, very condensed in some areas and quite sparse in others.

The colouring of the vein for me was also too purple rather than grey so didn't work with our colour scheme.

The quartz we ended up choosing is Silestone 'Lyra', it was the one I loved the most (also the most expensive out of all these options).

I felt 'Lyra' had more character than the other alternatives above.

There was a lot more depth to this design, the other designs were quite flat. 

Being man made it is never going to have the randomness of a marble Bianco Carrara, but for me this was a perfect alternative.

Can't wait to see the end result.