How to buy white Carrara marble tiles and slabs


Want to buy Carrara marble tiles or slabs? Everything you need to know

Block yard of Carrara marble
Yard of Carrara Bianco Marble Blocks

Whatever your preference or requirement, Carrara marble can be purchased in both slabs or fixed size tiles and are primarily available in a polished or honed finish. Slabs are approximately 3m x 1.5m on average and can be cut to specific sizes if required. Instead, tiles are fixed size and can commonly be sourced in a variety of dimensions; see below for details. 

Carrara marble tiles polished
Processing Carrara Marble Tiles in the polishing machine

*If you are a private client, contractor, architect, or designer, we can deliver to you wherever you are. All you need to do is find a stone fabricator or manufacturer in your area where we can deliver our product.


Tiles: What you need to know

When buying fixed sized tiles, the price is reasonably affordable as production is carried out from smaller unshaped blocks, this allows the fabricator to keep the price relatively low due to minimal wastage and production/cutting process.

carrara bianco marble C grade tiles
carrara bianco C grade tiles 600 x 600 x 10mm (24”x 24” x 3/8”)

As a rule, Carrara marble tiles are usually 10mm thick (3/8”) but 20mm thick (3/4”) tiles can also be available upon request, and while there are a wide variety of finishes available, with white marble such as Carrara, the two primary finishes are honed or polished.

Carrara Bianco C Marble Bathroom
White Carrara Marble Bathroom C grade Tiles used for wall and floor 600 x 300 x 10 mm (24” x 12” x 3/8”) polished finish

Tiles can be available in a variety of dimensions, the most common being 600mm x 600mm (24’’ x 24’’), 600mm x 300mm (24’’ x 12’’) and 300mm x 300mm (12’’ x 12’’); but, if the fancy took you, you could also request tiles of any dimension you require, so long as it they can be cut from the average sized slabs.

Carrara White CD Marble Bathroom
Carrara bianco marble bathroom CD grade tiles 600 x 600 x 20mm (24”x 24” x 3/4”) polished finish

Tile grade: 1st grade or commercial 2nd grade

First grade or premium grade marble tiles come with the highest price tag as a result of all the tiles originating from the same batch of slabs or blocks with consistent coloring and vein pattern. 

Carrara marble C grade Tiles
carrara bianco C grade tiles 600 x 300 x 10mm (24”x 12” x 3/8”) polished finish

Instead, Commercial grade marble tiles come from different batches of slabs or blocks so the colouring and vein patterns are less consistent and uniform. During installation, your specialist should spend some time carefully selecting tiles for optimal pattern aesthetics, this is usually done by doing a “dry lay” (laying down the tiles without adhesive). Though the tiles won’t match as accurately as first grade tiles, this is still a great option and very affordable for your bathroom wall & floor or any other type of flooring & wall covering.

Carrara marble CD grade tiles
carrara bianco CD grade tiles 600 x 600 x 10mm (24”x 24” x 3/8”) polished finish

Carrara is available in many variations such as Gioia, Venatino, C, extra or CD. The most available is the CD quality which shows a greyish background color and this is why the price is going to be quite lower compared to the others. The C quality Carrara characteristically shows a whiter background color, but being less available the price per square meter goes up significantly. 

Bathroom in Carrara bianco marble herringbone tiles
Herringbone carrara marble tiles bathroom wall

By doing a quick recap, the 3 main things you should be asking your supplier when requesting Carrara marble tiles for your bathroom or kitchen are: 

1. What grade is it? First or commercial from different batches/lots.

2. What’s the quality? C or CD, this makes quite a difference.

3. Is this Italian Carrara marble? Unfortunately, many suppliers around the world have started labelling their marble as Carrara even though they originate from different countries such as Turkey or China. Make sure what you are buying comes from Italy.

carrara-marble-white-Tiles-polished
Carrara marble C grade marble bathroom tiles 300 x 300 x 10 mm (12” x 12” x 3/8”) polished finish

Consider that most of the suppliers, especially those you find online on e-commerce websites, offer commercial quality products and CD quality at very low prices and so you should expect a product with pretty greyish background color and with variations and/or little consistency between tiles.

*If you are a private client, contractor, architect, or designer, we can deliver to you wherever you are. All you need to do is find a stone fabricator or manufacturer in your area where we can deliver our product.


Slabs: buying guide

While smaller, unshaped blocks are used for tiles, the opposite can be said for slabs. The ideal block for fabricating slabs are those that are well shaped or larger in size, even if there is a corner missing in a block it will still be used for slabs if it is larger in size. When it comes to slabs, pricing can be determined by a variety of factors including the quality of the slab and the amount of wastage you produce.

Carrara bianco C grade slabs
Truck loading of Carrara bianco C grade marble slabs 20mm thick (3/4”)

Overall, before wasting time on your search for the perfect slabs it’s always advisable to take the following factors into consideration to keep the overall cost close to your budget:

1. Waste is important

Use what we call the ‘’maximum exploitation method’’, meaning you should aim to choose a slab which is closer in size to what you need based on the dimensions of your specific project, with this in mind you utilize as much of the slab as possible and minimize your waste. For example, let’s say you want your kitchen countertop and splashback in Carrara marble with your countertop being 2.6m x 0.65m and the  splashback 2.6m x 0.70m, you should aim to find a slab which is approximately 2.7m in length and 1.4m in height. In the end the first rule with marble is ‘’do not create waste’’ or that is going to cost twice as much.

carrara-white-marble-kitchen-top
Carrara marble C grade Venatino kitchen worktop and island

2. Thickness

Choose slabs with a thickness of 20mm (3/4”); always keep in mind that the best quality Carrara marble blocks are primarily cut into 20mm thick slabs. 30mm slabs (1 1/4”) are frequently requested but these slabs are often of a slightly lower quality and are more ideally suited for countertops and not flooring or walls.

3. Quality

If price is a problem go for a CD quality rather than C, it’s still an excellent choice and a quality product.

Carrara Bianco C Marble Slab
Slab of Carrara bianco CD grade 20mm thick (3/4”) polished finish
Carrara marble C grade slab
Slab of Carrara bianco C grade 20mm thick (3/4”) polished finish
Carrara bianco C venatino
Slab of Carrara bianco C venatino grade 20mm thick (3/4”) polished finish

4. Shape

Don’t worry if the slabs have missing corners or are not perfectly rectangular shaped, your fabricator should charge you less and you would get a better deal if the slabs are not perfectly shaped. As long as you can get the cut-to-size products you wanted from those irregular slabs, you shouldn’t be too concerned with the slab shape and instead focus on the good deal you got!

Carrara marble vanity top
Vanity in Carrara C extra marble cut from Slab with missing corner. polished finish


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