30" Floating vanity - gold carrara marble vs regular carrara marble?

last year

last modified: last year

Dear all, thanks again for your help!

Here is a floor plan (blueprint) of our master's bathroom which is under total gut remodel now (at the drywall finishing phase now).

Here are some computer rendering:

Couple of questions:

1. The size of the floating vanity is 30". Since this mater bath is not big, for the mirror above the 30" vanity, we are thinking of having a 60" W x 40" H rectangular Frameless LED Light with backlit and front light (e.g., this one). This means that the mirror would not be symmetrical as the vanity (30"). Do you think this would look odd? Thoughts?

2. Since we have linear drain in the shower stall, so our designer recommended to have the same wood-look porcelain tiles that's on the bathroom floor to go into the shower stall floor and change the floating vanity to a "white" one. But wife thinks that she likes wood color vanity/cabinet better. Any thoughts? If we have wood color vanity/cabinet (with marble-look quartz vanity top), the entire floor (incl. shower stall floor) all "wood-look", the designer thought that it would be too "woody". What do you think? Thoughts or comments?

3. for the shower stall walls, since there are quite a lot of wood (oak) elements in this bathroom, so wife think that we should go with "gold carrara marble" large format porcelain wall tiles. However, based on my experience (see example below), "gold carrara marble" look of porcelain wall tiles sometimes may look fake (while regular carrara marble with gray/white colors usually looks more realistic). Any thoughts about this?

Thanks again for your help!

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Comments (4)

W C
Original Author
last year
last modified: last year
I found a newly remodeled bath which seems to have similar design as my wife's vision. The gold Carrara marble large format porcelain wall tiles look quite realistic and not spotty at all. Thoughts?
cat_ky
last year
I have seen both, and you can get realistic look from either. Shop around to you find just the right one. My personal preference is the grey veined ones, but, it all depends upon the decor. If gold would look better in your bathroom, then look for one that pleases you.
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JAN MOYER
last year
You are asking about real stone tile vs. porcelain tile. Both have their place...but porcelain fools nobody.

It is practical, requires no sealing. You will have a more difficult time, for shower floor- you don't find a lot of porcelain mosaics...to match the walls.

Real marble? Yes you will find a ton of mosaic, many shapes.

Whichever? Do not pair them.....one or the OTHER and don't forget your counter top.

Go to a stone yard. Get a designer. It's better than crowd source, here.
dani_m08
last year
last modified: last year
As Jan has pointed out in her post above re: not installing faux marble tiles with real marble mosaics/tiles/countertops - the same applies to faux wood tiles. If you have wood floors in your bedroom, you do not want to have faux wood tiles next to actual wood (or even LVP) - it will look odd to have real next to fake OR two different types of faux wood next to each other.

When I decided to use marble in my primary bath renovation, I looked at MANY different faux porcelain tiles after reading several posts on Houzz re: issues with genuine marble. However, in the end, I used genuine Carrara marble because there just isn't anything that looked even close to being genuine.

The only faux marble tiles that look nice are ones that chispa (active contributor here on Houzz) used in a bathroom finish. I've only seen photos - but the first few photos I saw, I assumed it was genuine marble. However, I think in a later post, it was revealed that they are porcelain tiles. I have some nice photos saved - but I couldn't find them - however, here is one from inside the shower (was recommending a shower bench to someone) -

Assuming that they are faux marble porcelain tiles - I imagine that they are expensive based upon the types of materials Chispa's has used in other areas of the home.

Also, the inspiration photo above is some type of faux Calacatta marble - not Carrara. Carrara tends to have more wispy veins - not strong veins as some other types of marble have.