Everyone wants a stone countertop in their new kitchen, but you may not know that natural stone is not necessarily the best product. Natural stone is limited in its variety of attractive designs and it is prone to defects. Also, it often cannot be matched when a replacement is needed, and there is only so much natural stone available. This has led people to seek out new materials. Necessity is the mother of invention, and the search for new materials had developed products that are actually superior to stone. Especially from a design point of view.

• Engineered Stone: This is the most popular engineered countertop material, perhaps because it is often indistinguishable from natural stone. But engineered stone, like Talostone, has some important advantages. For one thing engineered stone can be made to a specification, that doesn’t mean only color or pattern, but also size and thickness. This gives your designer incredible latitude to make a kitchen into a work of modern art. If that isn’t enough, super slabs can be made which are bigger than stone slabs, and they can be made in pairs, so there is no kitchen too big to be perfectly matched. Because they are made to specifications reasonable matching is possible if a slab is damaged.

• Concrete: Perhaps this product needs to get a new name, because the word concrete does not conjure up images of a luxury kitchen. But the reality is that concrete can actually be made quite beautiful with special fillers and professional finishing. Another advantage to concrete is that it can be made in a mold so that there is room for creativity, and concrete can also be poured in place to provide a purely custom fit to non-typical installations. Other advantages of concrete are its durability and its heat resistance. Concrete needs to be sealed in a specific way, and then resealed every few years.

• Recycled Glass: Recycled glass countertops can be some of the most stunning countertops you will ever see. Glass is an excellent design element for kitchens, and there is the appeal of recycled glass being an environmentally friendly product. However, recycled glass is not as durable as stone and prone to staining in some circumstances.

The kitchen of today is a long way from the laminate and particle board disasters of the 80’s, these days luxury materials are all the rage, and there is no shortage of options if you have the budget.