The secret to the popularity of Pental Quartz is its price, durability, and ability to mimic the beauty of natural stone surfacing. Not to be confused with quartzite, QUARTZ is a low-maintenance, beautiful, manmade alternative to natural stone.
The scratch- and heat-resistant (up to 250°F) qualities of Pental Quartz make it viable for kitchen counters, islands, bar countertops, closet islands, laundry rooms, bathroom vanities, and tub surrounds.
3. How do I care for Pental Quartz?
Use a cloth or sponge with mild soap and warm water for daily cleaning. Rinse soap thoroughly to remove soap residue which can affect the appearance of the surface.
Clean spills immediately and rinse surface thoroughly with water.
Remove stubborn spots using a soft, non-abrasive cloth or sponge with a mild and neutral cleaner along with plenty of water.
Avoid using harsh chemicals such as bleach cleaners on the surface.
Never cut or chop directly on quartz. Pental Quartz is scratch-resistant but not scratch proof.
Use a hot pad or trivet between hot pans or plates and the surface. Direct contact with extremely high heat can cause damage (such as with crock pots, electric skillets, etc.)
4. Where can I find Pental Quartz?
Pental Quartz is available from many outlets but most suppliers stock only small samples, making it difficult for a consumer to choose. IRG stocks full-sized slabs of Pental Quartz, allowing you to truly visualize this engineered stone in your next project
No one has a better selection of in-stock Pental Quartz slabs than IRG. Visit an IRG showroom near you (conveniently located in Brisbane, Dublin, and Sacramento) and IRG’s staff of surface experts can guide you through your selection.
Bold, Quiet, Excited, Relaxed, Energized, or Calm: Design Choices make a difference.
The studies are in, and they support the commonsense notion that interior design does indeed affect how you feel—emotionally and physically—inside your home. Whether subconscious or intentional, a person often makes design choices based on texture, color, and space. In other words: the immediate and emotional impact that an item evokes when you first see it can make you fall instantly in love…or not.
Let your feelings show.
Leaving all design decisions up to a professional is, of course, an easy way to operate. But that influencer must know you—what you like and how you react to color, surfaces, texture, and space. The newest looks, today’s design trends, and daily Twitter feeds don’t necessarily represent your preferences or the emotional impact you feel when reviewing these beautifully photographed surroundings.
At IRG, the designers we work with tell us customers are asking for new and statement-making uses for natural stone. While island waterfalls have become today’s norm, book-matched slabs used in home offices or as standalone art pieces are truly unique, one-of-a-kind applications that you might consider. At IRG, for example, our in-stock selections of Onyx or Calacatta Marble make stunning bookmatched natural stone statements.
Color is a biggie.
Almost everyone has a favorite color. Think about yours.
When you think about colors, ponder the following:
Why do you gravitate to that specific color?
How do you feel when you stare at it, does it bring back memories?
Is there a color family or varying tones that speak to you most often?
Besides clothing choices, where do you most often enjoy this color (or colors)?
Color therapy has been used in medical situations, public places, and vehicles. Adding color to a space can help achieve a different state of mind for the occupants.
Green and blue tones historically make surroundings feel more safe, calm, and relaxed.
Reds and oranges can add excitement, passion, and stimulation to an area.
Some color combinations can help us concentrate or feel creative.
Others bring back memories of pleasant times.
Identify colors that tire or depress you and your family and avoid them. It’s important to make your color choices personally and wisely.
Does bold stone speak to you?
Sometimes all you have to do is let the stone speak for itself. Large striking slabs used on walls or in large format design should be left to shine on their own. Rarely is there a need to enhance the dramatic impression natural stone can make by adding strong accessories or equally bold fabrics. When it comes to a brilliant—and often backlit—slab of onyx, no competition is necessary.
Nature is a natural.
Another option to consider is the effect of bringing nature into your spaces.
Natural elements can lower your heart rate and help you feel at peace with your life. Sometimes just the “awe” of a slab of natural stone puts a perspective on a situation. Knowing that a slab of marble has been in existence for centuries and that this element is right in front of you can literally bring you back to earth.
AT IRG, one satisfied customer mentioned “losing themselves” while staring at an elaborate piece of onyx mounted as a fireplace surround. Others tell us it feels like swimming or floating while in a bathroom lined with sensuous blue/green granite.
Design choices can bring out the texture and dimension of the stone and can also set the tone for the room: exciting, calming, thoughtful, energetic…and more. It can become a fascinating focal point or an ethereal transcendent mirage – the options for mood set through stone choice are fascinating.
Leave space for space.
How the space of an area is perceived isn’t totally dependent upon its square footage. Almost any physical dimension can become more inviting through the use of furnishing choices, color and lighting. Feeling cozy and snug versus claustrophobic is an example.
Transforming a small area into a feeling of vastness can come from the inclusion of a wall of natural stone, adding depth to a shallow space. Conversely adding a high impact stone choice to a very large great room can balance the openness. This rule sounds contradictory but don’t be limited by your boundaries.
Ask for Help.
When you’ve thought it through and you’re ready, let IRG help you choose the right surface for the design and mood that you want. IRG’s experienced staff can give you the personal attention you need to make that choice from an unsurpassed in-stock selection of natural stone. Call or visit us at an IRG showroom convenient to you in Brisbane, Dublin, or Sacramento.
If you’re thinking of remodeling an area of your home (including kitchen or bath projects), consider this: where you choose to purchase your surfacing materials might be just as important as what you choose. No matter if you’re looking for materials for countertops, islands, backsplashes, fireplace surrounds, shower walls or other installations, you always have choices about where—and what– you can purchase.
In this article, we’ll look at the differences between shopping at a big box store versus a specialty boutique.
Cookie Cutter or Custom: The Choice is Yours
Because big box chains can negotiate pricing based on volume, they’re able to offer lower cost to you, the end consumer. That might not be a bad thing if you don’t mind having pretty much what everyone else has. But if you are considering natural stone for your remodel or custom-built home, cost shouldn’t be your #1 driving factor.
How important is it to you– for your style choices and overall home look and feel—for your surface selection to be:
Unique?
Traditional?
Contemporary?
Rare or safely generic?
Then consider which stone surface store(s) can offer the price, quality, detail, and look that you want and your house deserves.
Boutique stores like IRG can offer you many beautiful and unique high-quality stones because for decades they have searched the world over for those specifications.
Natural Stone: Seeing is Believing
For a purchase as important as natural stone, you’ll want to see and select your stone from actual available sizes, not from small paint chip-sized swatches–big box stores rarely carry full-sized stone slabs. But at IRG, and other specialty surface retailers, you can walk up to a full-sized slab and more easily envision your final stone selection in your space – whether kitchen, bath, wall placement or other design feature.
Another important consideration is in-stock selection. Should you need more than one slab for your project (as with a wall covering or large counter), at IRG help is readily available and your choices can often be forklifted into an open area for better viewing. It’s difficult, if not impossible, for a big box employee to take time to work with you and your selections so directly, much less move 400-lb stone slabs for you to review.
Best of all, in an intimate showroom warehouse, you can reach out and touch the surface itself to see if your stone selection truly speaks to you and fills your senses with satisfaction.
The Shopping Experience
Crowded lines, long checkouts, packed parking lots sound familiar? Choosing a big-ticket item for your home is difficult enough without adding pressure and stress to the decision-making process.
Many big box stores can’t offer personalized customer service or a pleasant environment. Think about the experience you’d like to have and answer these questions:
Once you’re inside the store, is it a relaxing and inviting space where you’re personally greeted and asked about your needs?
Are the store personnel experts in stone and surfacing?
Have the buyers in the store traveled the globe sourcing stone?
Are you willing to wait? Volume may be available in a big box environment—but only if you don’t mind ordering and waiting for delivery.
Big box store employees may be tasked with stocking shelves, moving product through, or making sales so they’re focus is not on building a reputation or a relationship with a customer.
That’s why you’ll want to visit IRG.
Family Matters
Most natural stone shoppers prefer the personal attention and expert assistance that specialty stone shops offer. And, when your name is on the line, the customer is king.
IRG’s Owner Dilmohan Chadha has always had a passion for delivering excellent products with customer service to match. In 1986, my parents Dilmohan and Ameeta Chadha, began selling natural stone products and quickly became known across the Bay Area for remarkably high-quality natural stone. At the heart our Chadha Family business is the ethos of delivering the highest quality material, providing service to others, and maintaining a friendly atmosphere welcoming to all types of clients. I’m happy to be playing a role in continuing to grow our company legacy.
At the heart our Chadha Family business is the ethos of delivering the highest quality material, providing service to others, and maintaining a friendly atmosphere welcoming to all types of clients. I’m happy to be playing a role in continuing to grow our company legacy.
You’ve decided that this is the year to get rid of the avocado green bathtub and cracked tile and bring your bathroom to the 21st century. More importantly you want to renovate your bathroom not just to a point where it doesn’t make you groan, but to the point where you feel content in your surroundings.
OK, but where do you start? IRG has put together a list to help you get inspired to move your bathroom renovation to the next level.
Where to start?
1. Take Note.
One suggestion is to sit down with a notepad or iPad and think about how you want to feel when you’re in your newly remodeled bathroom. Think about logistics like:
Is this the one place in your home where you want total privacy, peace, and calm? Or is it OK for your children to have access while you dress and prep for the day?
Do you want a fast, easy dressing area to quickly get ready for work?
Would you like a lounge chair and/or a private dressing table area in an extended master suite to prepare for date-night soirees?
What other features will make this renovated room the bathroom of your dreams?
Now that you know how you want to feel (literally), about your bath space, determine which tactile qualities can make this happen for you.
Do you like soft surfaces?
rounded corners
fabric treatments
hardware that you just want to touch?
Or
clean, straight edgings,
utilitarian cabinetry
minimalist touches.
These are important qualities so take the time to jot down what comes into your mind and take notice—you’ll be living with these details for a long time.
2. Search Your Style.
Whether on the internet or by leafing through books and magazines, search for those images that match the specifics you’ve outlined. A few of our favorite interior design websites are:
Find an interior designer that you feel drawn to and become a follower. You’ll see posts of their latest projects that will inspire your bathroom remodel project and keep your motivational momentum going (See how IRG worked with interior designer Sarah Hoover here). We’ve listed other San Francisco/Bay Area designers who visit IRG in search of the latest surfaces including: marble, granite, onyx, pental quartz, quartzite, and soapstone. And trust IRG’s expertise to help complete their remodel projects:
Did you know movie set design can set the tone for interior design for decades? Think Diane Keaton’s kitchen in Something’s Got to Give or whole house interiors in The Holiday. Depending upon the style you’ve chosen for your bathroom remodel, try looking at historical dramas and period pieces. In-person strolls through art museums never fail to inspire, as does even a shopping trip to the mall where fashion can be your muse. The point is not necessarily to be literally looking for bathrooms that you like but rather to see what gets your attention and speaks to you in any way pleasurable.
5. Come to the Source.
When all is said and done, you’ll most likely want to start with your bathroom surface selections. This is where IRG’s vast in-stock inventory really shines. Nothing helps you visualize your bathroom better than seeing and touching the surface in person. Whether you want marble, porcelain tiles, engineered stone, (or even Onyx!), IRG’s staff of surface experts can tell you which surfaces will work best in bathrooms, help match a slab to your bathroom remodel budget, and guide you through your decisions. Schedule an appointment with IRG today.
Q: Why is this stone so unique? A: The deep blues and blacks take you away to the depths of mystery and peacefulness…
Q: Where can this stone be used? A: …which is why IRG’s Midnight Quartzite is so perfect when used as a backdrop for a luxurious bedroom wall or bathroom tub or shower surround.
Q: How do I care for this stone? A: Quartzite is heat- and stain-resistant, making it a very durable and practical material. That’s why you can use it on a spectacular waterfall kitchen counter or backsplash as well. Nevertheless, proper sealing will keep out the moisture and bacteria while retaining its magnificent appearance.
Q: Where can I find Midnight Quartzite? A: No one has a better selection of in-stock Quartzite slabs that IRG. Visit an IRG showroom near you (conveniently located in Brisbane, Dublin, and Sacramento) and IRG’s staff of surface experts can guide you through your selection. Schedule an appointment today.
Browse IRG’s full inventory of neutral and colorful quartzites here.
Paonazzo is a stylish marble extracted from the same Italian quarries producing popular varieties of traditional Calacatta Oro. Known as Paonazzo, Calacatta Paonazzo or Paonazzetto, this marble gets its name from the Italian word for purple and can feature deep violet veining upon an ivory background. However, the marble’s dark and bold veining often carries black, brown, or even unique blue-green tones.
A Taste of Honey
Paonazzo Marble features a lovely touch of warm coloration which has become one of its most admired and sought-after properties. Rich, honey-tinged veining gives the material a fashionable vintage-feel. And its rust, antique look emanates an old-world nostalgia that feels classically elegant as opposed to outdated.
Charming Choice for A Modern Kitchen
Paonazzo’s unique coloration and gold accents have become a designer’s dream for making captivating statements in chic, modern kitchens:
Chris Miniello of Birch & Tailor used IRG’s Paonazzetto Marble in an otherwise sleek, earth-toned kitchen in San Francisco’s Cole Valley.
Famed SF designer Geoffrey De Sousa created a work of art with IRG’s Calacatta Paonazzo. This elegant kitchen would be any culinary artist’s dream!
Homeowner and blogger Kelly Huibregste visited IRG during her search for the perfect marble and fell in love with Paonazzetto. She paired her marble selection with modern blue cabinets, along with brass and wood elements that complement gold tones within the countertop and backsplash.
IRG carries a vast in-stock collection of Calacatta Paonazzo Marble, further enhanced by sister varieties like Macchia Vecchia marbles. These vintage-yet-vogue stone choices can showcase wispier, feathered veining and stronger grey and honey tones with rust colorations.
Contact us to schedule an appointment to find the stone that matches your dreams.
The IRG Blog is your resource for stone product information, ideas and inspiration. Use our informational articles, project features, and product spotlights to help create your vision, then come into one of our showrooms to bring your ideas to life!
