QUARTZ WORKTOPS: COMPARING MATERIALS

As one of the South’s leading installers of granite and quartz worktops, we are very used to helping people compare very similar but different kitchen worktop materials. For people who visit our Charlwood, Surrey, Showroom and warehouse, it is easy to have a look at many samples and even large slabs in the flesh. But if you are on-line and exploring what is available, it is much harder.
All of the big quartz manufacturers have images of their whole range online, of course. But there is no easy way to be sure that photos found on different sites really are comparable. Under what light was the photo taken? How far was the camera from the sample? How can I compare two worktops photographed under totally different conditions? These challenges led us to evolve an approach to photographing worktop materials in such a way that our clients can make a meaningful comparison.

This is one of our first multiple quartz images, from 2012. This photo shows a good number of white mirror quartz stones, some of which are still big in the market, years later.  The Silestone Blanco Stellar has been a mainstay throughout these years.

Another older example – sometimes we photograph a number of kitchen worktop materials from the same maker so as to show the range that they offer. Here is the very striking Mistico series by Arenastone. 

We call these photographs “comparative quartz images.” Generally these involve relatively small samples, with the 4″/100mm square being typical. Placing a number of samples together with even lighting, checking the camera’s white balance for any colour bias the light may have – this has become routine. We only need to label the images in Adobe Photoshop, take the size down for web publication or email and you have a really useful image.

Large-scale launches from quartz manufacturers, where a whole range is reviewed and augmented at once, can be a challenge. A few years back Caesarstone launched a whole mass of marbled, high-end quartz worktop stones.  The Israeli company’s own images of individual stones are superb, but putting them together under even lighting still gave us a striking and helpful image for our customers to see the whole range.  

But the most frequent need is for images that compare materials from different quartz producers. This photo of  smooth white quartz products was taken in 2017, and is typical of what we try to send to our customers. With the minimalist, white units with white worktops trend still hugely popular, quartz worktops made from these materials, and especially our stock Affordable White, have been been important for us. 

The white printer paper was included to try to help show the variations in texture and hue of the different “whites”

Similarly, the white marble-look trend has grown and grown. Comparing relatively similar stones is ideally done by seeing them together in showroom or warehouse, but not everyone can get to see us. Even for people who can get to our Surrey kitchen worktop factory, these images are a great starter, helping to get the ball rolling in terms of what materials to ask for in your kitchen worktop quotation.