We've had large honed marble countertops for about ten years. If you don't want any etching or marks, don't get it! Water will leave marks if it's not cleaned up. There are water marks around our sink from water. It doesn't bother me. There is random etching from I don't know what? It doesn't bother me. On the other hand, nothing has ever stained it and we only resealed it once about a year after it was installed. I am a careful cook, if that matters.

Thanks. stains bother me more than etching . on the samples, i didnt see much etching on the honed one. the polished yes, but visible at certain angle.

i think if i ise marble, , perhaps honed is the better otpion?

i have fantasy brown in a summer kitchen for about 9 years now now. im paying attention to it now, as ive just dicovered its a marble, and i guess there is etching thst i see,, but its so blended that unless i went inspecting it with the purpose of looking for it, i never realized it in 9 years!! LOL all these years i thought it was quartzite.

I really feel for your situation and am sorry you are in this bind.

I love the look of marble and had marble counters for 10 years, They were gorgeous, stunning, and I will never have them again. Despite being careful, they were stained and etched. You never realize how much cooking oil jumps out of a hot pan (instead of in to the heavy duty vent) until you have marble. Water and oil were the biggest culprits. We are not wine drinkers either so never had to worry about that. If you are the kind of person to test samples and care about etching then marble is not right for you.

Ttanks kendrah. I sppreciate you sharing your personal experimce with marble. yes im in a tough spot. having jist paid 5k to have the cabinets refinished that worked with these countertops isnt somehting i can take a loss on. Its not like it was just a painted room, where i can simply just buy another can of paint and pick a diffent wall color that works and repaint it.

my comsidering marble is that, from my research, if a common problem in the market is that qjartzites are frequently mislabeled and are really marble , or if some true quartzites in fact do behave like marble, then why not in this case just get a marble if the color will work? perhaps im convincing myself of that due to my dilema. for example , have a much bigger issue with these counters that was present at install, however, the little cooking i did these past 3 weeks, have already stained the quartzite with hot oil. its mimor , but nonetheless, its obviois to me this quartzite is porpus.and probably behaves like a marble. yes, it is s true quartzite, i tested it before hand and the sample didnt stain; which is odd that it stained now🤷‍♀️ heres some pics, i wouldnt be making an isise of this, but it is something i noticed. and with the limited/ restricted cooking im doing through renovations, i anticipste thrse stains will just accumulate more and get worse with me cooking / baking as i typically do - which is daily for cooking; often for baking.

question maddie260 and kendrah…. do you recall the name of the marble you both had?

IMO any honed stone is a bad choice it opens up to staining. I think quartzite for you is a wrong choice since you have had nothing but issues withit. There are tons of white granites choose one of those polished and move on.

Here are pics of new quartzite issue. weird discolorarion along perimeter of island and along back wall of countertop .

fsbricstor has no idea whats causing it. initially thought water from cutting during fabricsrion, but its been 3 weeks! they tried dryingi it, a poultice left for a week…. nothing worked

Our fantasy brown counters were treated with More Anti Etch and 1 1/2 years in we have absolutely no staining or etching.

Thank you patricia , but i dont care for the look of granite, so its hard to jjust choose one and move on as you recommend. i have looked and if there was one that had a softer look id choose it, but that is proving to be difficult. most white granites i have seen are highly speckled, , dense tight patterns, or have flecks of marroon, black, or brown. I havent come across any that appeal to me.