Surfaces on show

Cosentino has opened a showroom in central Christchurch, a permanent base for the Spanish surfaces company in the South Island. It opened in May, and rather than a trade counter, the fit-out reads as a working interior, with the stone run across the floor, up a full facade, and into the tables and basins.

The showroom is pitched at the people who choose materials for a living, the architects, designers and builders who specify surfaces, along with homeowners partway through a build.

Cosentino supplies New Zealand through a network of fabricators and stockists, and the Christchurch space gives the manufacturer a shopfront of its own in a region where its products turn up in plenty of specifications. The local team works from the same floor, so a question about fabrication or a lead time can be answered on the spot rather than emailed away.

Cosentino’s portfolio runs to five brands, each covering different ground. Silestone is its mineral surface, made for kitchen and bathroom work. Dekton is an ultracompact surface built for outdoor and high-traffic use, where sunlight and heat would fade a lesser surface. Sensa is a natural stone treated to shrug off stains. Scalea is a range of natural stone marbles and limestones. And ĒCLOS, arriving soon, is the next generation of mineral surfaces, with a layered, 3D body-integrated design and superior heat resistance.

The fit-out sets them to work across a full interior, as flooring and facade cladding, as basins and shower trays, and as the desks and boardroom tables in the offices out the back. One wall carries the stone as an exterior facade, fixed with the ventilated system it would use on a real build, which makes the case that the materials belong well beyond the kitchen benchtop.

That variety is doing a job. A designer can compare full slabs and finishes side by side, check how a surface meets an edge or a sink cut-out, and see the newer collections in person before putting them in front of a client. Cosentino says those are the questions a printed sample tends to leave open.

The company also plans to run the space as a venue rather than only a display. Events, product launches and CPD sessions for architects and designers are on the calendar, along with collaborations across the wider industry. It says the response from the local design community since the May opening has been strong.

For Cosentino, the move signals a longer commitment to the South Island, and a place to build the relationships that decide whose surface ends up in the next kitchen, bathroom or commercial fit-out.