What Are The Pros And Cons Of Cultured Marble Showers?

Showers should be a place of relaxation and cleanliness. If your shower isn’t helping you relax or is constantly dirty, then you’ve got to make a change! Whether installing a new shower into your current home or selecting one for your new home, you’ve still got extensive choices to make.

Showers can come with all sorts of extra features and designs depending on your available budget, room size, and personal preference, but choosing what material to build it with is one of the most critical selections you will make. One of the most popular choices is cultured marble, but it’s not for everyone. It all depends on what you think is essential.

The Pros of cultured marble showers include cost efficiency, a beautiful look, customizable options, durability, and easy cleaning. The Cons of cultured marble showers include quality varying between companies, practically requiring a warranty, and a need to clean regularly and carefully.

When selecting the material to use for your shower, you might be overwhelmed by the options available, particularly for the material. Making sure the pros outweigh the cons for your situation is a big deal, as each material has its ups and downs. Cultured marble showers are no different, so let’s consider what makes them so popular!

The most significant advantage cultured marble has over its competitors is the price. Shower walls can get significantly pricy, and it all usually depends on the material you use. Marble is an infamously expensive material, but cultured marble still looks the part while being far cheaper.

The cheap cost is due to cultured marble not being “true” marble, as it is made with a mixture of marble and other ingredients. However, this brings the cost down by a long shot.

Something cultured marble has over pure marble is the ability to customize it to your liking. Do you have a specific color scheme you’re trying to keep for the bathroom? Well, that’s no problem at all! There are plenty of color options to pick from, something you can’t ever do with pure marble.

The customization doesn’t stop at colors, though: designs and patterns can also be specialized upon request. Cultured marble showers are made with a mold, so adding a pattern or specific aesthetic to your shower is far easier to add than with regular marble.

If you want a theme or specific color scheme for your bathroom, cultured marble would be a good choice. This is especially true since you can have the bathroom counters made with cultured marble as well, adding a consistent beauty to the entire bathroom.

Cultured marble showers are naturally tough, thanks to the blend of engineering stone and an adhesive. Marble is a key ingredient added to the engineering stone mix, but other strong materials are mixed in to give it durability.

For example, cultured marble isn’t easily chipped or damaged, thanks to the strength of the engineering stone. It also resists stains and doesn’t absorb water, great features for a shower in particular.

The added durability also makes cultured marble showers last longer in your home. Generally, cultured marble showers last for about 20 years, which is better than the usual 15.

Of course, other available shower materials can be made more durable or long-lasting, but cultured marble still scores very well in the endurability department. What makes cultured marble so appealing is how durable it is in tandem with the other listed benefits.

Some fancy bathroom materials require special cleaning products or a professional to clean or maintain them properly. Luckily, cultured marble isn’t like that at all. As long as the cleaning product is non-abrasive, you can clean your shower all by yourself!

Polishing is also a straightforward task when it comes to cultured marble. Automotive polish and a regular soft cloth will get the job done and bring the shine to your bathroom whenever it starts to go dull. For people that love having their shower glimmer, this is a great pick!

Cultured marble is excellent, but only when the mixture is made correctly. Getting the mixture right is very important, as having poorly-made cultured marble used to make your shower will ruin your bathroom. If the mixture isn’t properly balanced, it may not have the beauty you want, or it won’t be as durable as it should.

You might think, “well, then just pick a company with good quality!” The problem is finding one in your area. Companies everywhere want to sell you cultured marble at whatever quality and rate is cheapest, so you need to do quite a bit of research to find one with the quality to your standards.

Discovering a good company to work with will take time, patience, and plenty of comparisons and decision-making. You absolutely can not cut corners with this kind of thing, or else risk your cultured marble shower becoming a pain to deal with later in your house’s life.

So if you are thinking about getting cultured marble showers, make sure you recognize the amount of commitment it may take to get one to your standards.

Cultured marble showers can come with a warranty, protecting yourself from problems of poor quality. Companies with better quality often offer warranties to show good faith, so make sure to review their warranties and get one when you choose your shower.

However, this raises the initial cost and will range from company to company. Despite warranties being a good thing to have regardless, the fact it’s absolutely required to protect against bad quality is a bit contradictory.

Not to mention, if something does go wrong, having to go through the process of fixing or installing a new cultured marble shower is annoying at best, exasperating at worst. A shower reinstall could take days or even over a week.

Obviously, you won’t need to fix your shower if the cultured marble shower is good when you get it, so being sure there is no problem in the first place is very important. Always get the warranty, just in case, but seriously take your time selecting a cultured marble shower installer.

Though cultured marble showers are easier to clean than most showers, cleaning can still become a problem. Marble-like surfaces need to be polished regularly to keep them looking good. This means if you don’t polish and shine the shower often, the shower will not give off the sheen you want the marble to have.

That’s not to say it will turn to rust or fall to pieces. It just turns dull and loses the glimmer the shower has when well-kept. However, many people select cultured marble specifically for the way it looks and its nice glow and beauty. They don’t realize they need to upkeep the shine and beauty themselves, so please keep that in mind.

Cultured marble showers may be durable, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have to worry about damaging them. Cultured marble showers can be easily scratched, especially if cleaned carelessly.

Do not use stiff or rigid rags or abrasive cleaning solutions to clean or polish your shower, or you might risk leaving a mark. That’s not to say you have to walk on eggshells every time you clean the shower, but knowing how to take proper care of a cultured marble shower is required.

Also, despite being stain-resistant, this does not mean it cannot ever be stained. You still should avoid more corrosive cleaning products when you want to clean the shower. If you use something too strong, you could leave a stain nearly impossible to get out, and nobody wants that.