Two ways to read a wall that is not square
The laser digitizer rides a tripod around your kitchen and returns a cloud of points — every bow in the plaster, every cabinet that leans, every corner the 1970s said was ninety degrees and was not. The stone is cut to the room as it IS, not to the room the plan imagines, and you approve the seam map on screen before a blade touches a slab.
Photogrammetry backs it up on the awkward ones: a photo set of the run, scaled against two taped targets, is enough to cut a vanity for a crooked attic or a hearth for a chimney breast that has been settling since the valley had a railway. Old houses are our specialism precisely because the robot does not get tired of measuring them.
Services
What leaves the shop
01
Quartz counters — $71–89 / sq ft installed
Three-centimetre engineered quartz, non-porous and never sealed — the porosity argument ends before it starts. Undermount sink and cooktop cutouts routed on the CNC, edges eased or mitered from the same slab, and the pattern repeat unrolled beside a full slab so you know exactly what repetition costs.
02
Granite & quartzite — $83–116 / sq ft installed
The natural stones that shrug at a hot pan. Polished, honed or leathered faces; veins matched at every seam the bundle allows; a fifteen-year impregnating sealer applied on the bench the day before it travels. Quartzite is harder on tooling than granite and the rate says so.
03
Marble & bookmatched runs — $94–128 / sq ft
Consecutive slabs held in pairs from one block, opened like a book across an island or a hearth so the veining mirrors down the fold. We bookmatch where the room wants it and talk you out of it where the run will not carry it — a fold in the wrong place is a mural in the wrong room.
04
Waterfall legs & mitered aprons — $152 / linear ft
Legs cut as mitered pairs and glued overnight in clamps, so the grain runs over the island edge and straight to the floor without a visual break. Guests run a finger down the corner looking for the joint; that is the point, and the point costs patience, clamps and one long evening.
The Sorrell Downs, 2025 — 2026
Off the bench this year
Six tops photographed at handover — the actual slabs, veining and all. Nothing here is a render; stone does not render honestly and neither do we.
Fair questions
Seams, pores and hot pans
The five every first phone call asks. If yours is not here, the shop line at the bottom runs seven to five and the person who answers has chalk on their sleeves.
Where will my seams sit?
Seams land where slab size or cabinet breaks force them, mapped on screen at the template and approved by you before cutting. They are cut 1.5 millimetres wide, closed in epoxy tinted to your stone, and on bookmatched runs placed inside a vein so the pattern crosses the joint. You will find them with a fingernail, eventually.
How porous is each stone, really?
Quartz is non-porous — wine, turmeric and highlighter wipe off, and it never needs sealing. Granite and quartzite are porous enough to stain from a standing spill, which is why they leave here sealed; marble is the most porous and the most etch-prone, and we hand you a sample card showing what lemon actually does before you commit.
Which edges can I have?
Eased is included and is what ninety percent of the Downs chooses. Ogee, bullnose and half-bullnose are ground and polished at the bench by hand — the edge card near the foot of this page prices each per linear foot, published, because an edge you have to ask about is an edge we should not sell.
Can I supply my own slab?
Yes — fabrication-only is $36 per square foot plus the edge card, and we will tell you honestly if the bargain bundle you found is worth the truck fuel. A slab with a hidden resin repair or a kiln crack belongs in someone else’s shop, and you should hear that before you pay for it.
How long is the kitchen out of action?
Not a single day until install morning — the laser templates right over the existing tops. That one morning the old counter comes off, the new one sets, the sink gets siliconed, and the kettle is back on by four.
The robot cut my island to a room that leans eleven millimetres end to end, and the mitered legs swallow the whole lean at the floor. Two setters, one van, gone by three. I have the seam map framed in the pantry — it looks like circuitry.
They bookmatched a hearth out of two slabs from one block, and the fold lands dead centre of the chimney breast. The stone came from a quarry I will never visit; the drawing came from a kitchen table I had dinner on.
Fabrication-only on slabs I sourced myself — every other shop in the valley declined or doubled the rate. They flagged one bundle as a bad layup, were right, and cut the replacement the same week.
How it goes
From the tripod to the first breakfast
The same sequence on every job — the only variable is your project.
Visit 01
The yard and the reserve
Tuesday or Thursday at the Kettle Road yard. You put the reserve on the bundle you like; we photograph the faces so the stone you pointed at is provably the stone that lands.
Visit 02
The digital template
Two hours in your kitchen, laser on the tripod, photogrammetry for the awkward corners. You approve the seam map, the edge card and every cutout on screen before we leave.
Week 2
The robot and the bench
The file drives the CNC; sink and cooktop holes are routed, not angle-ground; mitered pairs clamp overnight; every profile finishes by hand at the bench under proper light.
Install day
The set
Old tops off and hauled, stone levelled to the cabinets the laser actually met, seams closed in colour-matched epoxy. We sweep the kitchen; the first breakfast is yours.
Profiles & extras
The edge card
Published, per linear foot
Eased edgeIncluded
The clean modern default, machine-cut and hand-finished
Mitered apron or waterfall leg$152 / linear ft
Cut and glued in pairs from the same slab
Ogee$44 / linear ft
The period S-curve, ground and polished at the bench
Bullnose or half-bullnose$29 / linear ft
Rounded for the elbows of anyone under ten
Full-height upstand$68 / linear ft
Stone instead of a silicone bead at the wall
Honing or leathering a face$13 / sq ft
Matte or textured, on any slab we stock
Yard reserves run Tuesday & Thursday · (555) 301-4820 · shop@gneissworks.example
Send the room; the robot does the rest
The room, the run in metres if you have them, and the age of the house — old walls change how stone should be templated, and we would rather know now. The fixed quote follows the scan. shop@gneissworks.example