Your house sounds cool! I would live to see pictures. There is a lot about soapstone on this forum and it really helped me decide this year. We did not buy from our local (mostly granite) yards because none of them could give us any detail on type or hardness of the 1 or 2 slabs they had. Even if you aren't near one of their locations I would recommend getting a sample of varieties from M. Teixeira. It was invaluable to us making a decision. We ended up having them fabricate too. Fantastic to work with and experts in this stone. It is handled much differently than granite and the fabricator our GC wanted us to use had us very concerned. I'm glad we took control on this. They are fantastic counters!

Most soapstone is gray until you add water or oil.

one thing I have read is that it is difficult to keep areas near the cooktop grey because of the oils used during cooking. Your space sounds lovely, just a caution if you plan to keep it un-oiled near the cooktop.

They did not have but a couple slabs of soapstone where I live and it was WAY too expensive, so we could not do it. But, if you go back to look at the soapstone, try scratching it with your fingernail, which you can do with softer varieties. Our yards wouldn't apply oil to show you the veining pattern, only a bottle of water to spray on and wipe with a rag.

I also ordered some samples from M. Teixeira. Unfortunately, I didn't feel comfortable with the local fabricators/installers who had no experience with it. But, if you like lighter gray (which was my favorite), in the sample pack I received one called Fantasy. It's light gray with wide white veining. Beautiful just like that, and the veins really pop when you oil it. It is softer.

Thanks everyone. We did try the fingernail test as well as a few taps with a pocket knife on the edge of the stone. No scratches with a fingernail but a few marks from the knife, though they weren't as noticeable as similar marks on marble, probably because there was so much veining and variation in the soapstone slab we looked at. I'm going to order some samples from M. Teixera to compare. Thanks for the advice everyone! We like the gray that it is now but also believe we would like it black if we end up oiling it. In fact our other option is leathered black pearl granite if the soapstone is just too expensive. We are still waiting to hear the price.

That slab is gorgeous. I am a little concerned that your stoneyard is so unknowledgeable about the name and anything else about it. Where are you getting a fabricator? So much of the "soapstone experience" is in the fabrication. There used to be a GW poster called "Florida Joshua", a pro who was an expert in soapstone installation, and even travelled across the country for a few Gardenwebbers to fix their soapstone installations - I think it has to do with how they sand the soapstone surface. I advise you to google "garden web" and "florida joshua" to read some of his threads on this topic.

Here is a thread I found about when Florida Joshua fixed Pluckymama's soapstone counters' finish, but there's many more: Thread about Soapstone Problems

You also asked about what color Silgranit sink - anthracite or metallic gray. I would choose the anthracite because I have seen how great it looks on this forum from people who have it with soapstone, and also because of your dark wood lowers and white uppers that you mentioned. Anthracite simply would go better with those. Just my $.02.

Because getting soapstone here is so expensive, we went with Black Pearl Granite in a Suede finish. I initially decided on the leather, but the leather from our fabricator had fairly deep pits, so we went for the suede. It's a softer black than the leather finish. It's getting installed in a couple weeks.

Designsavvy, you will be happy with your decision, I'm sure. We had a leathered granite in our last kitchen and we loved it because it was bulletproof. I really want the veining of soapstone on a waterfall edge but if the cost is prohibitive, I know we will ultimately be happy at least with the lack of maintenance on the leathered black pearl.