I think either would read similar in color. Stainless would be easier to maintain. And no divide. One single bowl is better for large pots and cleaning the stove grates.

I prefer a full divided 55/45 sink.

Ad far as the divided sink, I always ask my client if they hand wash dishes regularly, say 3-4 times a week. If so, one large bowl maybe frustrating, because it takes a long time to fill. A larger sink on one sink will allow for those larger pans on one side.

A low divide can be the best of both worlds, just keep in mind if you like to fill your sink with soapy water, it will not be very deep.

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Blanco's silgranite sinks are really lovely, and a dark sink in a light countertop can be dramatic.

Everyone will have their own opinion on sink brand, color, material etc..., but you are looking for opinion, so, as far as function - we have been living with a KOHLER K-3945-NA Vault Undercounter Offset Smart Divide for a year now and love it. This was a kitchen refresh and we only had a 36" base to play with. This sink probably doubled our usable sink space over the previous standard contractor double bowl, and the low-divide lets me easily wash my commercial roasting pans, half sheets, the all-clad roaster, lobster pots etc. Also, the apron-front sink, while I was skeptical of the style initially, gives you extra sink depth (front to back). I have the disposal on the right side and use a dish bucket on the left. I've only filled the sink across a few times but it's pretty handy when you need a whole lot of sink.

The other item I thought might be gimmicky was the sensor faucet. We ended up going with a Kohler Sensate and love the darn thing. So often your hands are wet or dirty when handling a faucet. The only problem... I find myself trying to turn other kitchen faucets on with a waive of the hand.

I vote for no divider. Use a small basin kept under the sink if you ever need the addition; bowl space. I prefer stainless to composite materials. But I think the Blanco sink looks lovely in the metallic gray color. It's not as dark as cinder. Blanco's stainless steel sinks get excellent reviews here and elsewhere.

Roanoke Woodworking Inc., great points, and all exactly why I don't want one large bowl, or a low divide. And I have no room for a dishpan under the sink - and really don't want one sitting in my kitchen sink. :-)

I do handwash. I have a great dishwasher, but it's just me, and often my most used dishes are just not enough to run the dishwasher. Simply faster to wash them. I don't fill the basin either , most of the time. Dirty dishes if I have any, are always placed in the left sink and I wash by hand on the right. I always keep one side clear and clean. I would always prefer the deeper sink though for those few times that do fill a basin, sometimes just for soaking a price of clothing. Just the way you get used to doing things I guess. That's why there are so many different styles.

Annie:

I change at least a sink every month and virtually every replacement is a large single bowl with an occasional low divide.

I personally don't care for the resin based sinks and would choose the stainless. It's a very personal thing, however, and wouldn't choose for you.

Re the divide, when I want to wash dishes or otherwise have a separation in my big single bowl sink, I put one or two dishpans in it. Voilà! A double bowl sink, presto change-o! You can't go the other direction with a divide.

A large, flat, single bowl sink may take a half step extra to clear down all the stray bits of this and that that go down the disposer or into the trash. That's the only negative I've found yet, and a very minor one.

For more sink people, try posting in the Kitchens forum.

I personally hate the low divide! I do handwash, predominantly pots and pans and plastic items. You can't fill the sink deep enough for me. I use a plastic dish pan, but the water cools off too quickly. I would love to replace it with a 2 bowl divided, one larger than the other.

I don't like the low divide either. If you have a roasting pan or cookie sheet for example that need soaking, you have to lay them at a tilt, and fill the entire sink up to the top in order to soak them because they are on a tilt against the divide. With a single bowl sink, you just lay them down flat, and the roasting pan itself or saucepan or dutch oven can be filled, rather than the whole sink. If it's a cookie sheet, you can just fill the sink an inch or two to cover the sheet, that's it.

I never use a separate dish pan in my single bowl sink. Large pots and pans are soaked as I mentioned, dishes and silverware are just scraped and then go in the dishwasher (don't rinse your dishes before putting in the dishwasher please).

I'm with friedajune -- I like to be able to soak things, and if I have a lot of handwashing (like after a bunch of baking), then I fill the largest bowl with soapy water and soak or wash things using that. The large sink is way better for almost everything else.

If small loads is the reason for hand-washing, consider getting a dishwasher that lets you do just the top rack, say, or get two drawers that can be used separately. Today's dishwashers are quieter and more efficient than those of 30 years ago, and using them wastes less water than hand-washing (where the rinse step is a killer).

LOL. I just bought a $1200 dishwasher. No plans to get another one. I wash dishes during the week. I run the dishwasher on the weekends, if needed.

stainless steel double if you wash your dishes by hand and wash your greens . I find it convenient .

Why "and wash your greens"? I have a single bowl sink. My greens go in a colander and are rinsed with the pull-out spray. I don't need a double-bowl sink for that. If I actually filled up a bowl with water and put greens in the water, they'd quickly get water logged and limp, plus they are swimming in the dirt you are trying to rinse off, so a colander with spray is better.

"stainless steel double"

I also think you need to qualify "double" because it depends on the width of the sink how useful a double bowl is. If the sink is 36" wide, a double bowl sink is very good. If it's 30" wide or smaller, a double bowl sink doesn't allow enough room for pots and pans in that width with the divider.

Miranda, just FWIW, there are situations where you most definitely do need to soak greens. I live next to a busy road, for instance, and it's definitely recommended to give the greens grown in such places a good soak in water with vinegar to remove the traces of exhaust and diesel fumes. They don't get waterlogged, trust me.

As it happens, I have a double sink, but I could do this in a dishpan in a single, so it's not a deciding factor in the type of sink to get.

Miranda33, FWIW, my sink is a fairly standard 31.5" ish double offset sink. Meaning one bowl is 18" from from front to back, and 13.75" wide. The right bowl is 14 x 16. I have absolutely no problem washing any of my pots and pans in this sink. I have always had a double sink of this size, and would not want a smaller one. I won't have anything that does not give me at least an 18" x 13+" of room in one of the bowls, either. I'm just used to having that much room and would not be happy with less.

We have done a fair bit of remodeling houses and rentals. The rentals we've bought all had stainless steel sinks. We've found that replacing them with a heavy ceramic sink cuts the noise from the garbage disposal considerably, even with inexpensive disposals. Stainless sinks turn into speakers that seem to amplify the noise. If you use a low noise disposal and ceramic sink, the noise is so low you have to listen to tell whether it is on.

The sink we have liked the best is a ceramic Kohler with a divider going all the way to the top surface of the sink. Our current sink has the divider only going to within an inch of the top. I find we like to set hot skillets on the sink to cool off and with the lower divider it becomes a balancing act to get it just right.

The sink pictured in Roanoke's post near the top of this thread would hold at least 10 gallons of water. With today's low flow faucets it would take 10 minutes to fill it half way. I don't have nearly enough patience to wait for that.

Yep I have no problems setting a hot skillet in my double stainless sink. Do it all the time.

"Perhaps you comments were not intended to be insulting but they were."

I think you're directing that at me. I had no intention to be insulting, and I've re-read my post, and can't find where I insulted you. I was saying why I wouldn't need a 2-bowl sink to wash vegetables, and how I wash my vegetables, and the reasons why I do it that way. I apologize if I gave offense, but really, I meant none. What part was insulting? I've re-read it several times!

I also asked for more clarity on what you meant by "double" in the way of size, and why I was asking. Was that the part that was insulting?

My lifestyle is such with family matters, taking care of my mother, plus my job, that I could never have the time to disinfect a sink every time I want to wash vegetables or greens. Is disinfecting a sink every time what everyone does, but I was not aware? Is it that I didn't mention disinfecting that you found insulting?

It's not on your list, but I love my Kohler Whitehaven cast iron farmhouse sink. A little pricey at just under $1000, but I expect it to last longer than my fridge and hopefully 20+ years, as my last cast iron sink did.

Miranda, some greens, even from grocery stores, do require soaking, such as watercress. There is a lot less sand in greens than there was a number of years back, however. Even spinach used to need to be soaked. You can use a mixing bowl or baking dish, however. You don't need to build in a soaking spot.

Another vote for a single bowl sink. I put nearly everything in the dishwasher, most of what doesn't go in is because it's too big: roasting pan, sheet pans, etc. I lay them down flat on the grate of my large single bowl sink, rinse, soap them up, rinse again. So much easier than trying to work around a divider, even a low one. The only way I'd consider a divided sink is if one side was big enough to lay that stuff down flat.

I soak greens in my salad spinner. Put them in, fill it up, soak, swish, etc., then pull out the drainer portion, pour out the water, reassemble and spin.

Seems pretty clear that you need to think about how you use a sink before deciding on which type of sink. What works for one person won't work for another. Many on the kitchen forum insist that a large one bowl is the way to go and, I'm sure for them, it is. I have both (a large one bowl at the lake and divided in the city) and, for the way I use my sink, the double bowl works best. Our divided sink in the city has one small bowl and a larger bowl and find that is ideal for us. I also prefer a stainless sink for looks and because I'm pretty hard on sinks and I think SS takes abuse well.

daisychain01, agreed with you completely. We all have different ways of doing things so what works for one does not work at all. I also prefer stainless as it cleans up so well, no matter what I do to it. :-)

I too prefer stainless - maybe it's the doctor in me, but I really want to feel I can sterilize it if something ugly happens or if I want to use it to soak greens, etc. I have a 30" single Krauss, and I'm happy with the utility of a single bowl. I thought I'd want a double with a low divide, but I don't miss a double sink at all. I have a drainer mat I can place over one end of the sink if I want to use one, or roll it up to put away if I don't.

After we have seen stainless sinks in use/abuse in bunch of showrooms we went for Franke Fireclay one bowl apron style and we absolutely loved it. It's beautiful white, complementing to our white kitchen, with some special hygienic coating, easy to clean and very quiet. Our decision was made right after we spot Villeroy & Boch logo. My wife has large collection of V&B porcelain and not one piece got broken in 35 years of use. Having said that we add SS bottom grid just for extra protection.

Here is the picture from Amazon:

We installed the Blanco Silgranit Diamond Super Single sink in metallic grey (it is lighter than the cinder) as the clean up sink. I have not used it yet, as we have not moved in, but am very happy with the color. I prefer a single bowl sink.

We have a similar kitchen countertop as you, "a white quartz countertop with some medium veining;" we installed Blanco Silgranit single sink in white. It looks beautiful with the countertop and is easy to clean with soap and hot water from spray faucet. Only a few times we need to lightly use Magic eraser to remove stains (from turmeric sauce drop that was accidentally left in the sink for few hours by my DH ).

I just pulled out a SS double and installed a single basin Koehler white cast iron. I like white cast iron, it just looks brighter, cleaner than spotty SS. When I do hand wash, I just fill the largest dirty dish - bowl, large measuring cup or whatever with hot soapy water and dip the sponge in that...wash a bunch of dishes, then rinse them. I don't care for double sinks because you can't fit a cookie tray (large lasagna pan, etc.) in the sink and I got tired of slopping water down the front of me while trying to rinse things. Personal preference, for sure, though...