Marble & Quartzite Countertops in Itasca, IL

No. Same shop, same crew, same published price in every town we serve — the 2.1 miles between Itasca and 2260 Elmhurst Rd is our cost of doing business, not a line on your quote. What changes your number is square footage, edge profile, cutouts and how much tear-out there is, and none of those are about your ZIP code.

Marble is neither the disaster critics claim nor the effortless luxury magazines suggest: acids like lemon juice, wine, and tomato sauce will etch dull marks into the surface within minutes, and no sealer prevents etching — sealers slow stains, not acid. In a year-of-ownership account published by the Natural Stone Institute consumer site, a hard-used marble kitchen picked up etch marks but zero stains, and the owners chose a honed (matte) finish specifically because it hides etching far better than a polished one. The real question is not whether it will mark — it will — but whether you will read the accumulating patina as character or as damage. If you know the first etch ring will hurt, choose quartzite or a marble-look quartz instead.

Despite the names, they are opposites: quartz is a factory-made slab of ground stone in resin, while quartzite is natural metamorphosed sandstone cut from the earth. Quartzite is harder than granite, takes hot pans, and delivers the marble look without marble softness — but it is natural stone, so it needs periodic sealing, runs roughly $70-$150/sq ft installed (2026 guides), and some stone sold as "quartzite" is actually softer marble-family rock, so ask your fabricator to verify with a glass-scratch or acid test. If you want zero maintenance, that is quartz; if you want a one-of-a-kind stone and can live with resealing, quartzite earns its premium.