That shower was likely custom fabricated. The veining in the panels joins perfectly. Major $$$.
Here is one of the makers of such shower panels:
Speaking of stone and showers, we have a slate shower and the tile guy used a sealer that backfired, the very next day it looked like ten years of hard water mineral accumulation. His answer was, ânever seen that beforeâ as he skulked away.
Can we acid wash or somehow remove that sealer and get back to the real stone?
^Wow, Iâd be furious. Did you pay him before he finished the work?
I only know if that happened to me, my contractor would have had it removed and new stone put in. But, my GC doesnât subcontract work out and doesnât get full payment until everything is done to the clientâs satisfaction.
I have a quick granite question. Iâm the one who had new counters put in earlier this week. They look great and all is wellâŠexcept for one thing. There is this one vein (actually this long curved spray of spots about 2 inches by 10 inches in a swirly kind of granite) that is slightly rough and not as smooth as the rest of the counter. Is this a problem? I emailed the company (English is not their strong suit; they are all Greek) but havenât heard back yet.
have the installer / fabricator come back and polish the area that is rough.
^^Yes. They have fine sandpaper that is finer than anything we can buy. Theyâll polish it up and itâll be fine.
I found my ultimate, dream backsplash:
https://tilebar.com/blue-macauba-2x4-polished-marble-tile.html
Only one problem - itâs $75/square foot!!! Anybody know of anything similar/close to this thatâs reasonably priced?
^^thatâs pretty! No idea where to find something for less.
So, my tile backsplash was put up by guy #1, who had good ideas, was cheerful, did a great job, and we generally loved. Guy #2 came on day 2 to do the grout, and he made a mess, and didnât wash off all the grout - smear. Someone unknown is coming on Tuesday afternoon to do the sealer (weâre hoping for guy #1âŠ). My question is, should I make sure they wash off all the grout-smear before doing the sealer, or should I do it myself on Monday to make sure itâs dry?
Wow, that tile is so pretty. Have not seen anything like that cheaperâŠ
Have you looked at engineered stone or quartzite makers if they have something like that?
â My question is, should I make sure they wash off all the grout-smear before doing the sealer?"
absolutely!
Beautiful tile. Sorry but no suggestions.
Weâre starting a large remodel at the end of the month. Weâre picking out paint colors and have selected San Francisco Fog for (most) of the walls. Iâve painted patches around the house and (newbie here) found that itâs too dark for the light-filled rooms but just right for our darker rooms. Iâm picking up SF Fog at 50% tomorrow and am hoping it will work for our light-filled rooms. The thought of starting over is way too overwhelming. My question here is that we have a beautiful new quartzite countertop that is whitish with gray veining. Swiss coffee was recommended as a good pairing with SF Fog but itâs pretty creamy next to my new countertop. Wondering if anyone knows paints here and has a suggestion for a trim color that goes with a whiter countertop. I am looking for a warmer color rather than a stark white. Our painter is partial to Kelly Moore but I could go with another companyâs paint if I want.
I donât have any suggestions either. This is my dream backsplash, but have never been able to justify the cost: http://www.greenriverstone.com/
Met with our builder over the weekend⊠unfortunately, stuff is expensive. He uses a lot of subs, which drives the price up a bit.
We did identify a few changes that will save us some money, and there are a few things that are going to have to get put off to the future, like changing the fireplace (at least $3K), replacing the garage doors ($5k), replacing and moving around some bedroom windows ($4K), or re-siding the house to match what we did on the basement ($7K? donât have a firm number for this).
We are going to bring in our own electrician for an estimate, since that piece seems so out of line. He is willing to work with whoever we want to use, so hopefully that will save a chunk of money.
We are going to downgrade some materials, like using bathroom vanities from Home Depot or Wayfair that come with counter tops and sinks already, this will save at least $3000 over what we had picked out at the kitchen place. Switching from quartz to granite in the kitchen will save a lot, since quartz seems much more expensive. And we are going to have to be careful picking plumbing and light fixtures. No $2000 rainfall shower heads, not that I would let my wife do that anyway. 
Our builder had originally planned to strip and re-shingle the entire face of the roof where we are roofing over the atrium. By patching it as best he can, and living with it for a few years until the roof will need to be redone, it saves about $5000.
Sigh. It sucks to have to compromise, but whatâs the way it goes.
Beautiful tile. I liked this tile on Houzz. But probably it is equally as expensive. https://www.houzz.com/photo/12060804-montecito-guest-house-contemporary-bathroom-santa-barbara
We actually ran into a bigger problem, though.
You may remember that the line for the flood plane illogically runs through a tiny piece of the front corner of the basement, and this caused us all kinds of headaches when we bought the place.
Well, it turns out that in this town, when your house (or any piece) is in the flood plain, they restrict how much you can spend in one year on improvements to a certain %age of the value of the building. I never heard of such a restriction before, and donât understand the purpose of it or why the town cares.
And me, being the genius that I am, filed (and won) a tax abatement in January, because the building plan the town had on file materially overstated the amount of sq footage in the house. I got the value of the building lowered by almost $50K! I thought I did a good thing!!
My hope is that the assessorâs department takes their time updating their systems, and the building department doesnât hear about it. Or I have totally screwed myself. Itâs a near thing with the old value (and will require some creative fudging of numbers that go on the forms the town wants), and with the new value thereâs no way we can do everything this year.
My only options are:
- pay for 2(!) private assessments of the value of the building, in the hope that it comes out higher than the towns's assessment
- pay for an elevation survey by a licensed surveyor to (hopefully) prove the house is actually not in the flood zone (around $1000)
- delay some major portions of the project until next year
We are going to try option 2 first, because if we wind up completely out of the flood zone it will save us on flood insurance next year as well.
Itâs always something.
Mathmom, that is beautiful!
NRE, I would kill my husband if he swapped my quartz countertops with granite. I am the sole cook in our household, and he knows better than to mess with my kitchen, lol. Have you priced quartz at other kitchen places? We had very decent luck with Costco services. The price was about the same as the lowest priced competition for that type of quartz, but we got 10% back as a Costco cash card plus 3% rebate for paying with Costco visa. We paid for demo, which you will not need to with a brand new build.
Notrichenough, we have that rule and it is 50% of the value of the house each year. I donât know logic either, but might ask our builder. He build a lot of coastal properties.
I would go with option 2 first as well.
@mathmom that is way cool. How much does it cost?
@tx5athome that looks like the same tile or very close. Maybe this? https://www.gridsurfaces.com/kaleidoscope-glass or something like this: https://www.annsacks.com/collections/blue-celeste
It was actually my wifeâs idea. 
What makes quartz so much better in your eyes?
I think we will probably go directly to one of the stone places and cut out the middleman. Maybe Iâll be pleasantly surprised but from what I have seen in the kitchen showrooms, quartz is substantially more.