News from the kitchen

The kitchen is no longer just a workplace. Room boundaries are disappearing in favor of an overall “living space”. As a result, the kitchen is increasingly becoming the communicative center of the home, where people also cook.

When cooking, the main focus is on the kitchen worktop, which, with its large surface area, makes a decisive contribution to the aesthetic character of the kitchen. No other part of the kitchen is subject to such heavy use. Almost all activities take place here. It must therefore meet special requirements, particularly in terms of durability and ease of cleaning. When choosing the material for a kitchen worktop, it is therefore important to test its resistance to moisture, dirt, stains and heat as well as its scratch and impact resistance. In addition to the traditional materials of natural stone, wood and stainless steel, laminate, artificial stone, solid surface materials and, increasingly, ceramics, glass and even concrete are also used today.

Suppliers of natural stone worktops who move away from mass-produced goods, focus on exclusive stones and deliver them with high-quality workmanship and reliability can be very successful, especially as the market structures in Germany, particularly in the area of natural stone suppliers for the kitchen industry and the kitchen and furniture trade, are very small-scale and often regionally oriented. Delivery reliability and service are decisive criteria for a kitchen studio when looking for suppliers of kitchen worktops.

This is a good starting point for stonemasons. Nowadays, every manufacturer has its own worktop collection, and if the standard worktop is not enough for the customer, the industry and trade are happy to fall back on individual worktops. Kitchen studios in particular, but also the kitchen industry, are happy to be looked after by responsible supply partners. For the stonemasonry company that offers the special natural stone worktop and can fulfill individual special requests – such as milled drainage channels or different surfaces on partial surfaces – it is worthwhile approaching the kitchen studio around the corner, the local dealer and perhaps even the manufacturer in the region.

And for companies that have already successfully embarked on this path, it is worth expanding their own product portfolio to include modern materials such as artificial stone or ceramic. All major natural stone suppliers have already included such materials in their range. As a glance at the market shows, these materials are becoming increasingly important.

Read more about different materials for kitchen worktops in STEIN in March 2014.