Last week, I went to F-W-S COUNTERTOPS to watch the creation of our vanity tops. We are planning to install three bathroom vanities at Hannah’s Hill – each with their own custom top.
In my stone cutting attire 🙂
Weeks ago, the process started with us dropping off our vanity bases at F-W-S COUNTERTOPS in Carbondale, IL. The three bases are antique pieces which I collected while living in Houston. They are sized appropriately for each of our three bathrooms.
Vanity bases leaving Hannah’s Hill
Master bath – circa 1840 Irish sideboard found at Colin Gibbins Antiques
Guest bath – Birdseye Maple chest found at Heights Antiques on Yale
Downstairs bath – French console found at Marbuger Farm
Then, over the next few weeks, we worked with Designer, Lori, to create the perfect design for each top. We designed the tops so they compliment each unique antique base – some have curves, some have straight edges, etc.
Thanks, Lori, for putting up with my many revisions and getting the designs just right for us!
For the tops, we used the slab of marble which Blaine and I hand picked in St. Louis earlier this summer. We chose a 3mm piece of Carrara marble in honed finish.
-
- Slab selecting with Blaine earlier this summer
Last week, the slab we selected was moved onto the wet saw area by Sean.
Then, Sean and I decided where to place the cutting templates. Our slab has fairly consistent veining and coloring throughout, so this made deciding where to place the templates pretty easy.
Cutting templates in place
Downstairs bath template
Sean carefully traced each template with a white pen.
And he lined up the blade for our first cut.
Our first couple of cuts
Master bath side-splash freshly cut (with sharp edges)
Master and Guest baths called for Eased edges; and downstairs bath (the curvy French console) got Ogee.
Sanding papers for cleaning up sharp edges
Various grit sanding papers
Aaron easing the edge of the master side-splash
Almost done
Finished eased edge on the side-splash – nice job Aaron!
Master back-splash getting eased edges
Back-splash done!
While Aaron worked on side and back-splashes, his brother Jose worked on the actual top for the master bath. Notice the corners of the top were cut at 45 deg.
Freshly cut master vanity top with 45 degree corners
Jose starting to ease its edges
Meanwhile, Sean continued to make cuts for the other vanities.
I spotted a tiny dino riding on the wet saw machine! 🙂
Downstairs bath – the curvy French console top about to be cut
We dry stacked the master vanity with its side and back-splashes to see how it’d look.
Bravo gents!!
Next step was to cut holes for the sink and faucet.
Jose cutting the hole for an under-mount sink
Notice it’s rough cut first – he’ll clean this up before installing the sink
Cleaning up and perfecting the size of the oval hole
More polishing and cleaning
We are planning to install a widespread faucet in each of the three bathrooms. Below, Jose cuts the three holes for it in the master top.
Our vanity faucet
Cutting one of the three faucet holes
After the holes were cut, the top was turned on its back to install the under-mount sink.
Jose centered the sink and prepared to attach it.
To secure the sink to the stone, he drilled four small holes to fit metal clips.
Applying a bead of silicon
Attaching the metal clips
Nice work, Jose!
I can’t wait to see this attached to the antique Irish sideboard and placed in our master bathroom!
Below, I caught a few glimpses of the detailing work of the French console top. Because the wet saw machine only cuts straight lines, Aaron hand cut the curves.
Here he is now applying the Ogee edge
See the Ogee?
Almost done…
I hope to share with y’all soon these finished vanities.
Thanks to Al and the crew at F-W-S COUNTERTOPS for allowing me to come behind the scenes to see our vanity tops made!
~Miranda