Marble No More

A couple days ago we received bad news from the showroom we were buying the Vietnam White marble countertop from. They were calling to tell us that they couldn't find one piece of marble big enough to fit the countertop under the plate and bowl shelves to the left of the refrigerator on the long wall in the Kitchen. The countertop was built based on their confirmation that we could make it up to 7 feet long. B made it under 7 feet by a couple inches. They called and said they wanted to make the top in two pieces and we could not agree.

counter section under shelves

It is an important part of the kitchen and it was based on their measurements!!! This is after they wanted us use a smaller piece on the side by the sink which meant the seam would be right down the center of where the future dishwasher will be (or now where the two shelves under the counter will be) and we first reluctantly agreed to that. Worse though, earlier, they told us they weren't 100% sure that they could make the curve of the undermount sink look good. I was already very skeptical of the whole transaction so this final call turned me off totally and we asked for our deposit back and sink (which had been sent to Malacca).

As we anticipated some issues with the marble (both marble and granite here in Malaysia tend to be harder to get contrators to do a good job, and hard to find nice product... most of the granite available that we saw was ugly 80s style speckled granite in gross colors and small slab sizes). Our backup plan if we ran into problems was to use Corian Solid Surface in Glacier White (see http://www.furnishism.com/elektra-glossy-ice-lacquered-by-ernestomeda/) if the marble didn't work out. But it means that we will be over budget. Fortunately, we located the official Corian installer in KL who had workers in Seremban day before yesterday. They came to the house and measured and we are waiting for the quote. It should be about 1,800myr more than what we were paying for the marble. Hopefully, not more. But, what it will do is make the kitchen look better and no seams will show and the sink should be curved nicely. Plus there was no guarantee that the marble wouldn't have chipped or discolored, at least with Corian we have a 10 year guarantee.