Hi y'all. I am new to this site and I'm impressed by what I've seen so far. I am hoping that some creative soul out there will be able to enlighten me with a great idea.

My husband and I re did our kitchen 4 years ago. About 4 months ago, we took out a wall that had 2 pocket doors that separated the eating area and family room. (I sure wish I could post a photo on here to show you what I'm taking about). The kitchen is obviously off the eating area. The kitchen has a granite counter top that has warm burnt oranges, black specs, a creamy color and a faint mauve. Where the wall was knocked out, there is a pole that is load bearing and it has had to stay... my husband creatively built a sort of corner unit thingy that has cabinets below and will have a counter top. We've decided to go with a concrete floor (we're going to acid wash it, then stain it a very soft warm burnt orangey/brownish color.
We received a painting by Rafuse for Christmas last year and so we've decided to paint and re do the kitchen and make the whole area sort of based around the painting. We are doing an accent wall in Dunn Edwards Mermaids Cove and 2 larger walls in Dunn Edwards Fine Sand. We thought about doing the counter top concrete since that what the floors are going to be. But the more I think about it, the more I think it will look like, "oh ... they must have had some concrete left over and used it for the counter top." I don't want that. If you don't know who Rafuse is or have never seen his work... he is sort of whimsical and fun... really a conversation starter if you ask me. I want the counter on the new construction to be fitting of this theme. I have thought of perhaps getting colored tiles (colors that are in the painting) and breaking them in medium sized pieces and then with a dark gray or black grout... tiling the top of the counter this way. This is probably the road I'm going down but I would sure love any other ideas people could give me. Maybe it would be fun to use another product... just throwing this out there... perhaps... oh heck... bottle tops... or the flat colored stones you see everywhere now... those are sort of bad examples, but I hope you get what I mean.
Please... send me your ideas. I can send you a photo of the painting if you want or if there is a way to add it to my post, let me know and I will do that. Thanks so much.
Happy Friday.

Kecia
(Hootie and the Blowfish's biggest fan)


I now see that I can add an attachment... so the pic should be below.


[IMG]http://i64.photobucket.com/albums/h1...hu/rafuse1.jpg[/IMG]

I like the concrete idea, I've really yet seen one that I felt really turned out nice, I think for your kitchen... have you ever seen some tile that is flat but has more of a smooth but stoney look to it. The edges aren't square either there more rounded and have a slight wave to them, to me they just look really earthy,
Meaning if you ran your hand on across it you'd fill the ups and downs , ridges, but they all be smoothed out, do you follow? Lol, I feel as if I need to have better punctuation that I'm doing but its late sorry. and I'm a contractor. Now back to the design

Id also attempt to stain the concrete a few colors inkeeping with the picture you have
As far as the process of concreteing your countertop a good tile installer may be able to do this, this is one of those jobs that you may not find a specialist in that field.

As for the mosaic tile you mentioned, we done this before, but only on floors, and coffee tables, id just make sure you get the edges smoothed out before you set the tile or make sure you set the tile deep enough that it covers the rough and sharp edges. As for the black grout I think it may be a little to dark, but maybe a dark brown would work better, just a thought, glavine