The Well-Known Countertop Trend That Now Makes Your Kitchen Look Outdated

When it comes to picking the perfect countertop material for your kitchen, there are so many factors to weigh, from cost and maintenance to color and aesthetic. Then... there's granite. Nearing the top of nearly every list of the "best" countertop options, granite is one you will see mentioned over and over (and over) again. It is easy to understand why, given that granite is a natural stone with unique color variations — not to mention it's extremely durable, heat-resistant, and low-maintenance. Sounds like a no-brainer, right?

Well, before you commit a good chunk of cash and an entire kitchen aesthetic to the always-great-on-paper granite, I feel compelled as a professional interior designer to warn you that selecting the wrong granite slab could instantly make your brand-new kitchen look outdated. And no one wants to spend all that money on new counters, only to have it look older than when you started renovating.

What is it exactly about certain types of granite that can make a kitchen feel so out of style? There was a time in the 1990s and 2000s when granite kitchen countertops were a sign of luxury, a top-of-the-line cherry on a perfectly-designed Tuscan kitchen. However, the cheaper slabs became the standard for builder-grade homes and were all the same — busy, heavy, glossy, and full of too much visual movement to be attractive. So, if you're at the stone yard looking at slabs for your kitchen renovation, be warned of which specific granite characteristics you'll want to avoid at all costs.

Looking back to Y2K, the ubiquitous granite countertops that graced every kitchen all shared a few common traits: They had a highly-polished finish, were extremely speckled, and were often heavy on the brown tones. These shiny, heavily-flecked countertops were incredibly busy and overbearing, visually competing with everything in the space. The splotchy warm hues sparkled in the most distracting way possible with the glossy finish. Though the material was supposed to indicate a high-end kitchen, the cheaper builder-grade slabs with intense speckling became the unfortunate norm. 

If you're considering new countertops, my advice as an interior designer is to steer absolutely clear of flecked granite unless you want your kitchen to look straight out of an episode of "The Sopranos" (though actually, Carmela's counters were wood-edged laminate, so maybe skip that option too). Do yourself a favor and opt for a more contemporary countertop choice, like quartz, quartzite, marble, soapstone, porcelain, or refinished butcher block, to name a few.

While the speckled, busy color variations of polished granite might make your kitchen look like a late 90s, early 2000s-era time capsule, there are some granite styles that remain a relevant option for a modern kitchen. A black pearl granite in a leathered or honed matte finish is a stunning option for those in the market for low-maintenance dark countertops they can really use and abuse. There are also very subtle off-white honed granite slabs with a more freeform, swirled similar to the veining of other natural stones like marble or quartzite, rather than a distinctly flecked surface. Lastly, there are some unique, dramatic granite colors in organic swirl patterns in deep blue, green, or other incredible hues.