DIY Granite Slab Work

[Jim K.]

Hi guys.

Does anybody else do basic granite and marble small slab work themselves?

[Jim K.]

Originally posted by @Bob H.:

I wish granite tile would catch on. I've built one countertop with a drop-in sink, like the ones @Johann Jells did, and it looked great at a much lower cost than slab granite. The only complication, compared to regular tile, is that I paid a guy to put bullnose edges on some of the tile with a grinder.

I bullnosed a 5x11  bathroom in granite tile with tools I bought on Amazon on a dirt-cheap Kawasaki variable-speed polisher in a vise. 21 linear feet. Very cheap. $3 ft2 granite tile on walls with bullnosed edges often comes out cheaper than ceramic tile with overpriced matching bullnosed edge pieces. You can train somebody to do the grinding and the polishing easily as well.

Since my wife is a potter, we've now reached the point where we have full custom tile-making, firing, and glazing capability through her home studio. We're also going to be getting into CNC panel woodcarving down the line, well before when I used to think we would. I do some custom cabinet building and metalworking.

Granted, a good amount of this is more about art and the fun of making stuff than making real estate $ for us,  but I tend to find quite a bit I can make money on hiding in the corners of the stuff we do together for fun. Slab granite has been a nice surprise for us.