Let’s Get Stoned – Granite in a BIG way!

By Brenda Lange
Finding the perfect granite: The O’Brien kitchen makeover

As in many homes, the kitchen becomes the heart and soul of the house. The family can be found gathered there day and night. Parties center around the source of food and drink; guests swarm like bees to honey.

This instinct to gather in the kitchen was at the root of the plans of Nicole and Kevin O’Brien as they laid out their remodeling ideas with Adam Karp from Let’s Get Stone’d, on Route 611 in Warrington.

The O’Briens lived in their traditional Doylestown home for four years before they began to renovate the kitchen.

“We knew we would do this only once, and we wanted everything to be right,” says Nicole O’Brien. Nervous about the whole process, she and her husband took their time to ask around, to examine all possibilities for everything in the kitchen, right down to the drawer pulls.

“Everyone is always in my kitchen” she adds. “We want this to continue to be the family socializing spot … and we haven’t used the kitchen table since we got the granite (counters),” explaining that the family of four eats meals at the convenient new island with its indestructible granite tops.

The couple chose LGS for the granite after considering other product at other shops. The other stores carried what O’Brien calls “run of the mill colors”. When they walked into LGS and spotted the Moscarella they ended up with, it was love at first sight.

“My husband said, ‘This is it!'” she remembers, when they spotted the granite they refer to as their kitchen “statement”.

The Moscarella is unusual and almost glows from specks of quartz sprinkled among brown veins, which wind through the light cream and rich golden tones of the base granite.

The O’Briens sat with Karp at the store and discussed options for their proposed uses for their kitchen and how the granite would fit in. The backsplash behind the stainless steel Thermador gas range was the only sticking point.

“We went to Adam with a sketch concept and went back and forth over the backsplash. This granite has such character, we didn’t want to put up a tile backsplash and take away from the granite.”

At Karp’s suggestion, they ended up with a full backsplash that extends right to the range hood. Different and unique, the O’Briens love the way the backsplash puts an exclamation point at the end of the kitchen renovation.

“He took all the time we needed and answered all my questions,” says O’Brien. He even cut a sample block of the Moscarella. She carried it around with her for three weeks making the rounds of various contractors to match colors of paint, draperies, cabinets and lighting fixtures.

O’Brien describes her old kitchen as done with speckled “Smurf blue” Corian countertops that didn’t really match the cabinets made of “builders’ grade” oak, that didn’t really match anything else. A wall separated the kitchen and breakfast room, and the overall effect was disjointed and chaotic.

The wall came down first, creating a large, open, and inviting space. The new custom cabinets are of country white with dark glazed accents, which match the brown in the granite. The new hardwood floor, likewise, is a deep rich brown, which in turn complements the aged bronze bar stools, drawer pulls and knobs. Drop lights contain variegated elements of the gold-painted walls, cream cabinets and brown accents.

The center island was one more creatively unique touch that thrills O’Brien. Formerly an octogon, the O’Briens opted for an entirely new shape. Almost heart-shaped now, O’Brien describes it as the “Superman emblem island”. Designed in two levels, the lower level allows O’Brien to do meal prep while her two sons sit at the upper—or bar level—and chat with her. LGS covered both levels in the Mocarella granite, beveled the edges, and even ran the granite up the backsplash there, between the two levels.

All the elements in this kitchen weave together beautifully, with the finishing and unifying touch—the countertops, pulling everything else together.