Am I crazy or is this a poor quality seam?
EDIT/UPDATE: Thanks everyone — really appreciate all the responses and validation. A couple of clarifications/updates below.
The material is a large-format porcelain worktop - 20mm XTONE Taj Mahal Silk — rather than natural quartzite/granite. I chose that deliberately and am happy with it as it looks better than the engineered quartz options I saw and quartzite was too expensive for me.
The bigger issue is that this is actually the SECOND attempt at this worktop.
The first seam was placed in the middle of the island, at its most visible point, without consulting me. It was huge, misaligned and had an obvious valley through the joint (pics below), so I rejected it and the entire island worktop was remade.
For the replacement, I reviewed and approved the cut sheets (pics below). The new seam location is deliberate: it keeps almost the entire 3.15m island as one uninterrupted piece, with only a ~30cm section beside the booth separated.
My issue is that, after remaking the island once already, the replacement seam is still too wide, uneven, poorly finished and untidy at the front edge.
The Kitchen company agree this needs fixing again, but at this point what would you consider fair compensation on top of rectification?
This is an expensive bespoke kitchen, the worktop has now failed twice, the issues have delayed the project by over a month, and other subcontractors have also caused problems requiring remedial work. At this point I feel a meaningful price reduction is justified — particularly given how much of the QA I’ve effectively had to do myself. What % of the overall kitchen contract would you consider reasonable?
————————————————————————
Hi all
Had a new countertop installed and I’m unsure whether I’m being too picky about the seam. Would appreciate opinions from people who know countertop fabrication/installation.
Main things I’m concerned about:
- The seam looks quite wide and visually prominent to me rather than a tight hairline joint.
- The width seems inconsistent along its length.
Some of the filler/epoxy looks rough or slightly ragged along the edges rather than perfectly straight.
- From a lower angle, parts of the seam appear slightly raised/proud of the countertop, and it catches the light.
- The point where the seam meets the front finished edge looks particularly untidy.
- The filler is very light/white, which seems to make the seam stand out against the warmer countertop
- I actually think the two pieces themselves are reasonably well matched, so my concern is mainly the quality of the seam finishing rather than the slab/tile match.
Is this within the normal standard you’d expect from a professional installation, or should I ask the fabricator to come back and improve it?
Just a note: this was a very expensive bespoke kitchen install, and the cost is far greater than competitors locally in the UK. As a result I may have higher expectations than usual but want to gauge how reasonable I am being.
Thanks in advance for any advice!