Apelux workshop

A stone company,
built on patience.

Est. 2014 · Dandenong South

We began with a stubborn question: what if a benchtop could outlive the house around it? Twelve years later, the answer is a workshop in Melbourne's south-east, eighty stones in the library, and three hundred homes that will not need replacing in our lifetime.

Daniel Petrov, Founder & Director
Early workshop
— The beginning

It started with a broken kitchen.

In 2014, Daniel Petrov tore out a five-year-old engineered-stone benchtop that had cracked at the sink and stained under a coffee cup. A stonemason by training, he was certain there had to be a material that simply did not fail — one that could take heat, water, acid and time without flinching.

He found it in sintered porcelain stone: a slab fired at 1,260°C until it vitrifies into a single mineral mass, dense as granite but engineered to be flawless. He imported two slabs, fabricated a kitchen for a friend, and never looked back.

Apelux was registered that winter, working out of a single bay in Dandenong South with one waterjet and a borrowed forklift.

12yr
Of practice since 2014
340+
Homes & projects completed
84
Stone finishes in the library
28
Craftspeople on staff
Stone slab detail
— The material

We chose one material, and learnt it deeply.

Plenty of companies sell a bit of everything. We decided early to sell one thing — porcelain stone — and to understand it better than anyone in the country.

That focus shows in the details: how we bookmatch veining across a twelve-metre run, how we mitre an edge so a 12mm slab reads as solid stone, how we cut a sink so the drainage grooves disappear into the pattern. These are not things you learn selling laminate on the side.

Every slab still comes from a single quarry region in Sassuolo, Italy — the same source we started with — chosen for the depth and honesty of its veining.

Milestones

Twelve years, slab by slab.

2014The founding

One bay, one waterjet

Daniel registers Apelux and fabricates the first porcelain kitchen from a single rented bay in Dandenong South.

2017The library

The slab library opens

We lay out our first forty finishes at full slab size, so clients can choose stone the way it should be chosen — by walking it, not by a sample chip.

2019The crew

Installation brought in-house

We stop subcontracting and build our own installation crew, so the people who make your stone are the people who fit it. Quality stops slipping between trades.

2022The workshop

2,400m² and five-axis CNC

A move to our current Glomar Court workshop, with five-axis milling that lets us shape stone in ways the industry thought were reserved for marble.

2026Today

Three hundred homes on

Eighty-four stones, twenty-eight craftspeople, and a body of work featured in Belle, Vogue Living and The Local Project — still from one Melbourne workshop.

What we hold to

Three things we won't compromise.

We're not the cheapest stone company in Melbourne, and we've made our peace with that. These are the principles we'd rather lose a job than break.

— 01

One roof, no handoffs.

We sell, fabricate and install. The drawing on the page becomes the stone in the room without passing through anyone else's hands, so nothing is lost in translation.

— 02

Made to outlive us.

We warrant the stone for twenty-five years because we have never had to honour a claim. We build as though the people in your kitchen will be your grandchildren.

— 03

The stone is the hero.

Our job is to frame the material, never to upstage it. We choose honest stones, cut them with restraint, and let the veining do the talking.

Workshop floor
— The workshop

2,400 square metres on Glomar Court.

Italian slabs arrive at our dock as raw blanks. They leave as benchtops, vanities and walls — matched, milled, edged by hand and checked four times. You're welcome to visit on a Friday morning and watch it happen.

— The people

The hands behind the stone.

Work with us →
Daniel Petrov

Daniel Petrov

Founder & Director
Elena Marchetti

Elena Marchetti

Head of Design
James Okafor

James Okafor

Workshop Manager
Sophie Nguyen

Sophie Nguyen

Client & Trade Lead
Start something

Bring us your project.

Whether it's a single island or a whole-floor fit-out, the first conversation is the same — and the first home measurement is on us.