I never respond to meaningless polls.

By rank:

Solid surface (Corian), Granite (Quartizite included), Engineered stone, plastic laminate, wood, steel, marble, tile, concrete.

On another thread, DK Haas posted a number of times about Houzz survey results and how they conclude Quartz is most popular, despite people telling him/her that the Houzz polls are meaningless. I hope s/he sees this one, and realizes this is what the "Houzz survey results" s/he is relying on as fact are based on. They cannot possibly be statistically significant, both due to the few people who respond, and the skepticism they are met with.

It's almost like asking, select your favorite paint color? Each project is unique to the homeowners personal taste, design sensibilities and budget. Each of the materials listed has it's pros and cons. Our advice is always keep an open mind and come with ideas. So often our clients surprise themselves with their final decision. Have fun with it

Why are you asking?

Joseph, how do you feel about soapstone?

In the kitchen... I'm not fond of any stone or concrete for counters. Though having a slab of marble on the counter to work on sometimes is nice. Not fond of tile for counters in general, though I've seen them more in bathrooms than kitchens. Though I got a nice big 14x14 tile to set up my crockpot or other countertop hot stuff on when needed.

I rather like stainless in a commercial kitchen, but not so fond of it in the home kitchen. Love the look of wood counters but it's not as practical has just having wood boards or blocks to use on your counters.

Got no idea what else exists other than the laminate, so I guess laminate is my favorite for kitchen counters.

Soapstone makes a fine countertop, but you've got to be into the funky look.

There’s nothing funky about soapstone. It’s silky smooth, impervious to everything, completely organic. The opposite of plastic Corian.

I love my porcelain tile countertops because I can set hot pots and pans down everywhere (and I do) and I don't have to worry about hidden germs (epoxy grout) and everyone thinks it's slate (which is exactly the look I was going for). I hate granite. To each their own.

We made a last-minute decision to switch from porcelain (Neolith) to stainless steel, as we didn't want to take any chances with cracks or chips. As others have said, this is both a functional choice and a design choice.

For our house, stainless steel is a great addition to the rest of the materials that we used in the kitchen. But this wouldn't necessarily work in other houses, where solid surface could be a much better fit.

And I love the fact that it is heat resistant and that I can work directly on the surface. Very useful for baking larges batches of bread. It does scratch up when you do that, but I don't mind. It's a living surface.

So, yes, without context that poll is pretty useless.

"There’s nothing funky about soapstone."

Obviously you haven't spent much time here. Don't make me look it up, please.

To Joseph's point, you do have to be into soapstone. We fabricate and install soapstone all the time. Great material, but it's not for everyone.

I really like the way Granite looks.

Soapstone: Can be beautiful, especially just after it is oiled. The touch is nicer than any other stone. Heat resistant, so pots can go from stove to counter and does not etch or need sealing. "Funky". Completely. If you use it, it will almost always be of various shades, as oil is removed or something gets on the counter. I have the hardest soapstone I could find. I can't recall for certain, but between Moh's 4.5 and 5.5 and it still scratches like crazy. Just have to accept as patina, or freuently sand it. For bathroom, I hope for a porcelain slab without the look of stone. Just me, but if it is going to look like stone, then I want it to be stone, even if that results in trade offs.

Grace-

I don't know you, but these sorts of polls are difficult to answer.

Can you tell us more?

e.g.

1. What would be your favorite countertop if you were a messy cook

2. What would be your favorite countertop if you had no household help and by the time you finished cooking and eating you were so exhausted it was either hours or the next day until you had the energy to clean up

3. What would be your favorite countertop if your children liked to help in the kitchen but they don't always remember to use a trivet under something hot. Sometimes I don't remember to use a trivet.

4. What would be your favorite countertop if the family's favorite drink was home made lemonade made fresh squeezed every day. And the grown-ups drank wine at night with dinner. Red wine.

(And we have stock in Mylanta ;)

4. What would be your favorite countertop if you were a germaphobe.

And then being a germaphobe thought something was only clean if you could scrub it with steel wool and Comet/Ajax or pour Clorox on it every night?

5. What would be your favorite countertop if your counter had a curve or corner and you would be upset if the pattern was different from one part to the other?

Having only experience w/laminate, I have no basis for comparison. However, what I *want* when we do the kitchen is solid surface.

Granite slab. Quartzite if I can afford it as its become very hot with colors that rival manufactured quartz. Definitely looking at soapstone for my next personal project.

I was at a large stone and quartz dealer today picking up quartz samples for my current round of quartz testing (which has turned into a super interesting project). I was appreciating how some of the engineered quartz patterns have improved. Not bad, I thought.

And then I wandered over to the stone slabs and I was just blown away by how gorgeous they are. Marble, limestone, quartzite, pegmatite. Love, love, love. No wonder I became a geologist. :)

Joseph, we’ve had soapstone for the past five years and have loved it (we inherited it with the house). I was more just curious about your professional thoughts since it was left off your ranking list above. I agree that you have to be comfortable with it not being perfectly uniform at all times.

Funnily enough, we seem to be leaning towards Corian in our new house (well, new to us. It’s 98 years old). We’ve had it before and loved it too.

Basically it seems like I subscribe to your newsletter. :)

Heh, I'm finding the soapstone commentary kind of funny- guess it's one of those things I didn't know existed for kitchen counters before this thread. Only way I know the stuff is for stone carving/whittling or the sticks you use to pencil up other stuff. Lovely velvet feel for feeling when ornamental, and perhaps kind of luxe for a bathroom like a lot of other stone- but not something I associate with a kitchen countertop.

But then I'm not fond of stone for kitchen counters in general, so I might have a bias there. I rather like stone in a bathroom overall, and in kitchens on the floor or sometimes on the wall- but when it becomes counter it strikes me as trying to eat/cook off a floor/wall tile.

I bake a lot, including larger quantities of yeast dough. I also make a lot of fresh pasta. One of the really important features of a countertop was that it has to allow working directly on the surface. Stone meets this requirement. Doesn't get damaged by scraping with tools. And as an added benefit, if I set a hot cookie sheet down on the countertop, the heat doesn't damage it either.

This was the same reason why we initially were so attracted to sintered surfaces. But turns out, their one weakness is that they can crack or chip easily.

Any resin-based material is a poor fit, if you (ab)use your counters the way I do.

We ended up using stainless steel, as it has most of the same benefits as natural stone, except for the fact that it scratches up. But that's similar to how soapstone works. It's a living surface that you have to accept will change over time. I am fine with that. In fact, soapstone would have been high on the list of materials that I would have chosen ... if it fit the rest of the style in our kitchen.

But there are plenty of others who would never need to work directly on their counters. So, what is important to me might be ridiculous to you.

18k gold.

You can always re-sell it.