Natural Stone Countertops For Kitchen and Bathroom

Accent with mosaic – ideas for low budget decoration and improvement

2009-05-14T11:08:00.021-05:00

Stone mosaic is a long lasting decorative material. It makes and excellent accent in the interior. You can play with the mosaic in the interior and create the look and feel that is perfect for you.
Mixing and matching stone tiles of smaller sizes is a traditional way to create a mosaic pattern.
2”x2” tiles or smaller come mesh mounted and grew very popular among home owners and designers. It is commonly used as a backsplash. With combinations of stone, glass, and metal you can emphasize the countertop stone, or add colors to the space, or created a shiny reflection of the light and brighten up the room with polished glass and metal.
Renovating the entire room may be costly. But creating color spot can change the feel and look of the entire room.

For example, no need to renovate the entire bathroom. Placing colorful, contrasting mosaic around the mirror or creating a line through out the walls and playing with the matching or accenting paint color, adding matching candle holders can be an enexpensive way of giving a new bright, or refreshing, or calming look and feel to your bathroom. Another decorative and practical place for mosaic is entrance. Tile on the entrance floor is a well known practice. But why not use tile for coat hanging area. Choose your mosaic to give your entrance style.
Visit Stone Sourc Inc stone mosaic and glass mosaics pages, take a look at mosaics available, have fun decorating your space.

Rainforest Marble - Rainforest escape

2009-05-05T13:57:00.013-05:00

Marble is a classic stone that has been used for centuries as building and decorating material. White marble is well known for the use in sculpture for the softness of the stone and relative resistance to shattering. And low index of refraction of marble lets the light penetrate several millimeters into the stone and gives it a “life” look of human body. Black and pink marble were also but occasionally used for sculptures. And all colors were widely used for interior and exterior decoration and as building materials.

Modern days technologies allow to have marble not only with polished surface, but to give it a different look and feel with honed, tumbled, and brushed finish.

Today’s feature is Rainforest Brown Marble with brushed finish. The surface of the stone is brushed with coarse wire brush that gives a stone soft weathered appearance and texture, and brings out it’s veins and contrast of the color creating a masterpiece of rainforest painting on the tile, inviting you to explore every line on the stone and greet it with your touch.

You can play with the tiles like Rainforest Brown Marble in many different ways in your interior. It makes a perfect floor, impressive entrance, or just a framed part of the wall for your eyes to rest and mind to wonder of.
Take advantage of low prices offered by Stone Source – Direct importer of the stones to improve or decorate you home or office.

Do-it-Youself countertops for homeowners to install by themselves

2009-04-30T14:15:00.001-05:00

Granite countertops are popular updates for the kitchen and bathrooms. They are durable, beautiful, and easy maintaining.

But the whole updating project can become quite costly considering the fabrication and labor. We have found the solution to minimize that expense.

Stone Source just started a new line of granite countertops – GranitEEZ®. Granite comes prefabricated from overseas in several standard sizes (depth and length) and surface finishes, which allows you to reduce the cost of the granite countertops significantly.

We went even further on cutting down the cost of installation by creating a do-it-yourself granite countertops. It is a simple 3 step process. Countertops come to the customer with an instructional video demonstrating in details the installation. Plus, we provide in-store one-on-one training to guide customer through the entire process.

Thus complete countertop update project comes down to purchasing the granite at a wholesale price which makes it affordable and “wishes turn into reality”.
www.stonesourceusa.com/

Marble Institute of America about Granite Countertops and Radon/Radiation

2009-04-27T13:34:00.005-05:00

For the past couple of years there have been a lot of discussions and argues about harmful properties of the granite. Stone Source would like to bring your attention to the video released by Marble Institute of America containing the results of scientific studies of the granite, examining over 80% of granites offered on USA market, the misunderstanding and mixing of physical terms and the properties they describe, and the programs developed to ensure consumers of safety of granite they buy.

www.stonesourceusa.com

Granite Countertop vs Marble Countertop

2009-04-20T13:46:00.000-05:00

I CAN"T PUT MARBLE IN MY KITCHEN, CAN I?

YES YOU CAN!!

Stone Source offers multiple non-granite options for counters. These options include marble, travertine, limestone, and onyx. These stones make a distinct impression and can be a beautiful alternative to granite.

Maintenance is the biggest concern among most homeowners and many are often told by others in the industry that these stones do not make a good choice for kitchens. We think they are a fantastic choice for kitchens, vanities, or bars and here is why.

Staining – red wine, oil, & acidic fruit can stain a white or lighter marble, but the same is also true for lighter granites. Any light stone should be sealed properly and that will prevent staining. Things that can stain should be wiped up quickly – something most of us are used to doing with laminate tops anyway. Stains that do happen to set are almost always removable.

Scratching – yes marble can scratch easier than granite, but less easily than laminate or solid surface options. You don’t want to cut directly on either surface. Granite will dull your knives, and marble will scratch. The difference with stone is that the scratches are removable. If you need some re-polishing every 5 years, is that so bad? You do have your deck re-stained to achieve the look you want.

Sealing – don’t believe all the hype. Sealing is very easy, that is if you can handle a spray bottle and a rag.

Feel confident about getting the stone you want for your home.