Crosswater Faucets Review & Rating Updated: March 15, 2024

Imported

China

Portugal

Italy

Bath­room Brands US, LLC
Trading as
Crosswater London^®
393 Fortune Boulevard
Milford, MA 01757
(844) 992-8371
(508) 381-0433

Bath­room Brands Group, Ltd.
Lake View House
Rennie Drive
Hartford, Kent DA15FU
United Kingdom

Rating

Business Type

Product Range

Bathroom Faucets

Certifications

Brands
Crosswater London^®

Street Price

$310 - $840

Warranty Score

Cartridge

lifetime¹

Finishes

Lifetime

Mechanical Parts

Lifetime

Proof of Purchase

Required

Transferable

No

Meets Federal Warranty
Law Requirements

No

Warranty Footnotes:

1. The term "lifetime" is not defined in the warranty.

2. The maximum amount of any claim under the warranty is the purchase price paid for the product. It is not clear whether the purchase price includes shipping, taxes, etc.

This Company In Brief

Crosswater London^® is the registered trade name under which the British sanitary wares company, Bath­room Brands Group, Ltd. sells fau­cets, other sanitary wares, bathroom furnishings, and accessories in North America through a subsidiary, Bathroom Brands US LLC.

Many of the fau­cets are striking designs and all seem to be of good to very good quality featuring top-drawer components throughout.

The Crosswater warranty is standard for the U.S. and Canada, providing a lifetime guarantee to the original owner against defects in materials or workmanship. It does, however, have several legal defects.

Cross­water Lon­don is the registered trade name under which Bath­room Brands US, LLC sells fau­cets, sanitary wares, bathroom furniture, and bath accessories in North Amer­i­ca.

The Company

Bathroom Brands US, LLC was formed in 2016 as a subsidiary of the Bri­tish sanitary wares company, Bath­room Brands Group, Ltd.

Bathroom Brands Group is the result of a merger of two U.K. sanitary wares businesses: Bath­room Brands Ltd. and Cross­water Ltd. in 2014. The companyh soon after moved to a renovated facility at Lake View House in Dartford, England.

Cross­water is the older of the two companies, formed in 1998 by former Lon­don policeman, Da­vid Hance, to wholesale Eu­ro­pe­an fau­cets in Eng­land.

The business was quite successful enabling Mr. Hance to start buying other businesses including Simpson Showers in 2006 and Bau­haus bathroom furnishings in 2008.

Derek Patrick Riley and Tim M. Powell formed Bath­room Brands Ltd. in 2005 to import Chinese-made sanitary wares into the U.K.

They opened a buying office in Shanghai and spent several years building an efficient distribution chain linking Chinese factories to U.K. distributors that reduced handling, delivery delays, and product defects.

The company maintains its Chinese connections and its buying office in Shanghai. In 2015 it opened a second office in Singapore organized as Bath­room Brands (Asia) PTE, Ltd. which supplies the Group with porcelain sanitary ware from Malaysia's booming ceramics industries.

The Forte Group

Bath­room Brands' entry into the U.S./Canadian market in 2016 as a Delaware limited liability company was carefully planned.

There are two big barriers to overcome for a successful entry. The first is building an adequate distribution network. The second is complying with the convoluted maze of laws and regulations that govern the sale and installation of drinking water fau­cets in North America.

Distribution often makes or breaks a new entrant into the North American market. The inability to build an adequate distribution network quickly is often the main reason for the failure of foreign companies migrating to these shores.

Lack of distribution contributed measurably to the withdrawal of

Bath­room Brands ensured nationwide distribution of its products by partnering with the Forté Buy­ing Group.

Forté, formed in 2001, is a specialized hardware buying group composed of upscale decorative plumbing and hardware showrooms and design centers located throughout North Am­er­ica.

By joining up with Forté, Bath­room Brands gained instant access to 500 member showrooms, ensuring a continent-wide distribution of its products immediately on entering the market thus shortcutting the often years-long process of building a distribution chain.

The limitation of the arrangement, however, is that Cross­water brands may be sold only through Forté member stores, a restriction that could stifle the future growth of the brand.

Regulatory Compliance

Bath­room Brands was also largely successful in negotiating the labyrinth of laws, rules, and regulations that govern the importation, sale, and installation of fau­cets in North Amer­i­ca.

Faucets are highly regulated products and the requirements are complex. U.S. regulations at the national level are administered by at least two different departments of the federal government.

Various state laws add requirements for the sale or installation of fau­cets within the state that are often more stringent than federal rules, equally convoluted, and differ from state to state.

In Canada, the situation is no better.

The company must conform not only to federal laws and regulations but to the laws and regulations of the various Pro­vinces which, due to Canada's particular federal-system architecture, are often more important than national laws.

The Faucets

Crosswater has a much larger footprint in the Eurozone than it does in North America, selling a much broader array of products. At our last count, it offered 42 collections (the company calls them "ranges") of sanitary wares in the European Union under the Cross­water brand, and eight more under its economy brand, Adora.

Bath­room Brands sells just twelve collections in North America that include sink fau­cets and one of these, the Waldorf is in the process of being phased out as of the date of this report.

The collections span the range of style families from traditional through transitional into ultra-modern.

Most collections include sinks, tub fillers, and accessories (towel racks, robe hooks, etc.) as well as fau­cets for a nicely tailored, coordinated look.

None of Cross­water London's fau­cets is manufactured by Bath­room Brands Group. Some are made in Europe. Most, however, are manufactured in China.

Arcade

The Ar­cade collection is distinctive enough that we doubt it is from any manufacturer's

Bath­room Brands, however, is silent regarding the provenance of the design but hints that Da­vid Hance may have had a hand in it with actually saying so.

Whatever its genesis, it is a particularly striking design family, reminiscent of the styles of the late 19th century manufactured by the French company, which offers a Gal­lic vision of a fau­cet in the French Art Nou­veau style from what the French call the Belle Époque period of the late 19th and early 20th centuries that paralleled the Late Victorian and Edwardian eras.

Unfortunately, this collection is being phased out and may no longer be available as you read this.

Belgravia and Waldorf

The Bel­grav­ia and Wal­dorf collections are made by A.G. Monteiro Lda, a Portuguese manufacturer located in Braga, a city of 193,000 in northwest Portugal. A.G. Monteiro is .

The Bel­grav­ia collection is very English. It is one of our favorites, a clean and crisp interpretation of Ed­ward­ian styling which should give the high-end faucets a little more competition in this design class with less costly fau­cets.

The styles are similar to some of the Art Deco fau­cets designed as part of the Da­Vin­ci Col­lec­tion by Ben­nett Fried­man for AF/NY and now sold by Har­ring­ton Brass fau­cets are generally much more expensive.

The Waldorf collection is in the process of being closed out as of the date of this report and my no longe be available as your read this.

MPRO, Taos, and Wisp

MPRO, Taos amd Wisp faucets are very contemporary but based on a very old 1968 faucet design by Danish architect Arne Jacobsen for the Dan­ish Na­tion­al Bank building in Cop­ha­gen.

The Jacobsen design was radical for its time but has been so widely copied that it is now commonplace – still stylish, but no longer revolutionary.

These collections are made in China and imported through the company's buying office in Shanghai. We know nothing about their manufacturing other than what we can discern from examining the fau­cets themselves.

The manufacturers may be highly respected manufacturers, or not, and companies, or not.

We cannot say until we know the identity of the companies – which so far Cross­wa­ter has not been willing to share.

The faucets are unlikely to have been designed exclusively for Cross­water and are probably straight out of the of the Chinese companies that make them.

The MPRO (sold in the UK as the Mike PRO) in particular is very common in Asia, made with minor variations by most Chinese fau­cet manufacturers of contemporary fau­cets.

The only uncommon feature of the Crosswater versiion of the design is its knurling surface treatment.

Forté Group Faucets

The Ber­ea, Dar­by, and Ley­den,were originally developed by Forté Group as part of its in-house brand.

These collections are mAmer­i­can in styling. They Ley­den features the sweeping curves of traditional Amer­i­can styles. The Ber­ea and Dar­by, reflect period styling of the late Victorian and early Arts & Crafts eras. Both are very interesting designs.

The fau­cets were inherited by Bath­room Brands as part of its agreement with Forté Group which by that time had decided that the daily nuts and bolt business of managing a fau­cet collection was more burden than it wanted to shoulder.

Jeff Valles, the former spokesman for Forté insisted that Am­mara fau­cets were original designs by members of the buying group.

For the Berea and Darby collections, he may be right. These are distinctive fau­cets, unlike the usual Chinese designs.

But, we know the Taos and Ley­den are straight out of their Chinese manufacturer's because we found them. The Taos is in the Seagull Kitchen and Bath Products Co., Ltd. catalog as item number 9L1454CP7. The Ley­den is 9L1458CP7.

The faucets are imported, through Markimex, a California distributor that sells its own

UNION

The UNION collection is a crisp, ultra-contemporary Italian design in the same family of industrial-chic fau­cets as those in the Brooklyn 31 series created by

Crosswater lists the fau­cet as a transitional design. It's not. It would, in fact, be hard to get more urban-ultra-modern.

The fau­cet was designed by by Antonio Gardoni and Federico Castelli Design of Brescia, Italy for IB Rubinetti S.p.a., the Italian company that owns the design and supplies the fau­cets to Cross­water.

IB sells the fau­cets all over the world (except North America) as the Bold collection.

Cross­water buys these fau­cets off-the-shelf with minor modifications necessitated by North America's continuing love affair with its quaint "customary units" (inches and feet) rather than the metric system adopted by the rest of the civilized world.

The collection won a Good De­sign Award in 2019 in the Bath and Ac­ces­sor­ies category.

Good De­sign is an international design competition sponsored by the Chicago Ath­e­nae­um Mus­eum of Arch­itect­ure and Des­ign and the Eu­ro­pe­an Cen­tre for Ar­chi­tec­ture Art Des­ign and Ur­ban Stud­ies has been held annually since 1950 and is the oldest and most prestigious juried design competition in the world.

A fau­cet that wins a Good De­sign award is at the pinnacle of product design.

Fenmore and Heir

The Heir collection is stylish with polished facets that give it a gen-like appearance. Its design is similar in concept to the Lambeth lavatory fau­cets designed by Jon­a­than Brown­ing and sold by

The Fenmore collections is also very contemporary but much less impressive.

We don't know the manufacturer(s) of these fau­cets or where and by whom they were designed. A Cross­wat­er spokes­per­son declined to name the manufacturer(s), claiming that the identity is "proprietary".

Faucet Designs

David Hance, the former London policeman, is credited by the company with the design of "a number of stylish collections", but only the Bel­grav­ia collection is linked to Mr. Hance by name in any company literature.

How much Mr. Hance is involved in the design is a matter for conjecture.

Sources within the company indicate that while he provides ideas and inspiration, he has little role in the actual nuts and bolts design process that includes engineering and prototyping which are typically handled by the company slated to manufacture the fau­cets.

In its promotional literature, The company refers several times to a "design staff", but no details are ever provided and no staff designers are ever identified, all of which suggests that the design staff may be more aspirational than actual.

Companies that have an in-house design staff such as are not at all shy about publishing the identities and accomplishments of staff designers and the awards they have won in international design competitions.

IB Rubinetti S.p.a., for example, the supplier of Crosswater Union fau­cets, has a whole section on its website devoted to its fourteen designers, describing their training, achievements, and design philosophies.

Bath­room Brands has employed at least one outside designer, Kelly Hoppen, MBE, a South African-born interior designer and U.K. television personality.

Ms. Hoppen is unknown on this side of the Atlantic, but quite famous in the U.K. She was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) by HRH Elizabeth II in 2009 for her "services to interior design".

She designed several Cross­water collections sold in Europe. None of these, however, has crossed the Atlantic. These are striking fau­cets, however, and here's hoping they arrive on these shores soon.

Faucet Construction

Crosswater fau­cets are made using conventional construction in which the body and spout channel water as well as give the fau­cet its appearance.

None of its manufacturers use the newer core and shell construction^[1] in which the waterway and decorative shell are divorced.

The waterway is constructed of tubes inside a decorative shell that gives the faucet its appearance. The advantage of core and shell is that much less expensive leaded brass can be used to make the shell with no risk of lead contamination since the water never touches the shell.

Although Crosswater describes its faucets as being of "solid brass construction", the claim is not entirely true. While the primary material is lead-free brass, some components are made from a zinc alloy.

Brass

Brass is the traditional primary fau­cet material for two reasons:

• Brass is strong but easy to work with. It casts, forges, and machines with relative ease.

• Brass is naturally anti-microbial. The copper in brass kills bacteria, retarding the build-up of potentially hazardous microbes inside a fau­cet.

A Short Note on Chinese Faucet Manufacturing

Because so many junk fau­cets originate in China, Chinese fau­cet manufacturing has gotten a reputation for making cheap, unreliable fau­cets — in far too many cases a well-earned reputation.

But, Chinese manufacturers also produce some of the finest fau­cets made anywhere.

The very upscale, Eng­lish-designed brands of mid-priced fau­cets is one of our Best Val­ue fau­cet lines.

Other upscale fau­cets manufactured in China include fau­cets made for

The fact that a faucet is made in China is not dispositive of its quality.

Other factors need to be examined. Among these are:

• Certifications: Uncertified faucets tend to be very cheaply made using lower-grade materials and poor construction technology. The primary reason that most are uncertified is that the seller believes they would not pass the extensive testing required by North American standards. (Learn more about uncertified contraband Chines faucet at Amazon's Contraband Faucets .)
• Reputation As is true of any business, Chinese manufacturers that make good quality faucets earn, over time, a reputation in the industry for high-quality manufacturing. This reputation is generally a reliable guide to quality.

Brass has one serious drawback, however. Traditional brass contains metallic lead.

Ordinary (Alpha) brass is a blend of copper and zinc with a small amount of lead (1.5% - 3.5%) added to make the material more malleable, less brittle, and easier to fabricate.

Lead, however, is now all but banned in North Amer­i­ca in any drinking water component due to its extreme toxicity to humans, particularly children.

According to the En­vir­on­ment­al Prot­ec­tion Agen­cy (EPA), lead, even in small amounts, causes slowed growth, learning disorders, hearing loss, anemia, hyperactivity, and behavior issues.

Before 2014, a fau­cet sold in the U.S. or Can­a­da could contain as much as 8% lead and still call itself lead-free.

Now the maximum lead content of those parts of a fau­cet that touch water is 0.25% (1/4 of 1%), basically just a bare trace. In fact, there may be more lead in the air you breathe than there is in a fau­cet that has been certified lead-free.

To comply with the restrictions on lead, today's fau­cet brass replaces lead with other additives to reduce brittleness without adding toxicity. The most common is bismuth.

Bismuth is similar to lead – right next to lead on the periodic table of elements – but it is not harmful to humans.

It is, however, very expensive. It is 300 times rarer than lead, even rarer than silver, which is why bismuth-brass alloys are considerably more expensive than leaded brass.

However, Even leaded brass is rapidly getting more expensive.

Brass is typically about 66% copper and the price of copper is rising exponentially as the number of electric vehicles increases.

Copper is an important material in electric vehicles. The typical EV uses up to four times more copper than regular gasoline or diesel vehicles. By some estimates as many as 50% of the vehicles sold in the U.S. by 2030 will be electric.

Just as the need for copper increases dramatically to combat global warming, the world's supply is decreasing.

The expected surplus of copper through 2024 has all but disappeared. In consequence, the price of copper has skyrocketed with no expectation of increased supplies in the near future.

This additional cost of brass in general and lead-free brass, in particular, has encouraged many fau­cet manufacturers, including those that produce Crosswater fau­cets, to use substitute materials where possible.

Zinc & Zinc/Aluminum Alloys

The most common substitute metal is zinc or a zinc-aluminum (ZA) alloy. One of the most common is called ZAMAK, a composition containing 4% aluminum.

Zinc is not as strong as brass and does not resist water pressure as well as brass. However, its use in non-pressurized parts of a brass fau­cet such as handles, base and wall plates, and is common.

It does no harm when used in these unpressurized components and may save buyers a few dollars.

At the moment, Crosswater faucets are still primarily of brass construction. But expect Crosswater, along with most other faucet companies, to increase their use of zinc alloys to contain the rising cost of faucets.

Faucet Components

The Crosswater fau­cets we examined were good quality fau­cets, including the fau­cets made in China. The key to good quality is good components, and Cross­water uses some of the best.

Valve Cartridges

Valve cartrides are the single most important components in a faucet. They control the flow rate and temperature of the water passing through the faucet. If they fail, the faucet is out of business until they are repaired or replaced.

Two=handle faucets use what are called "stem cartridges." or "headworks." They control only the water flow. The left cartridge controls the hot water and the right cartridge the cold. They are usually not interchangeable and typically bought in pairs.

Single-handle faucets need a "mixing cartridge" that control both water flow and temprature. These are more complex devices invented by in the 1970s, but now adopted nearly universally.

Kerox Kft

The valve cartridges in Crosswater's single-handle mixing fau­cets are made by Kerox Kft, a Hungarian manufacturer of technical ceramics.

The company makes only mixing cartridges and has gained a worldwide reputation for excellence.

Other brands known to use Kerox cartridges include to name just a few.

Flühs Drehtechnik

Two-handle Cross­water fau­cets are fitted with brass ceramic cartridges from Flühs Drehtechnik, GmbH, a German firm located in Lü­den­scheid, Germany since 1926.

The company, world-known for its precision machining, is generally thought of as the manufacturer of the world's best single-function stem cartridge. Flühs (sometimes spelled Fluehs for English speakers) valves are heavy-duty products with an established reputation for leak-free reliability.

Faucet lines known to use Flühs cartridges include

Aerators

Most Crosswater London fau­cets also include Ne­o­perl® aera­tors.

Fau­cet aerators used to be simple devices that merely infused a little air to soften the water stream so it would not splash out of the sink.

Today, however, they are precision products used to limit water volume to the lower flows required by federal and state water conservation laws, and in fau­cets with pull-out sprays, to prevent back-flow that could contaminate household drinking water.

It is important, therefore, that this little device, often smaller than a dime, be the best available. And that, almost by definition, is the Swiss-engineered Neoperl® aerator.

Handle Styles

Many two-handle Crosswater fau­cets offer at least two handle styles, cross and lever.

The handle style is selected when the fau­cet is ordered.

The UNION collection is a little different. It offers a lever that is similar to the handle on an industrial shut-off valve, or a wheel handle in place of a traditonal cross handle. These are colored red.

Faucet Finishes

Eleven finishes are available on Crosswater faucets. Any finish other than polished chrome can add to the price of the fau­cet, sometimes substantially.

Graphite is the latest finish, available only on the two Fenmore faucets that are new to the company.

No one fau­cet is available in all eleven finishes. Every fau­cet is available in Polished Chrome or Polished Nickel. The other finishes available on a fau­cet depend on which manufacturer makes it. The Taos collection offers five (Polished chrome, Polished Nickel, Satin Nickel, Matte Black, and Polished Gold), the most we found in any collection.

Four faucets in the MPRO collection are available in Stainless Steel, Matte Black, or Polished Brass. The Wisp collection offers Stainless Steel (but not polished Brass or Matte Black).

The Ber­ea, Dar­by, Ley­den, and Taos collections can be finished in Satin Nickel or Bronxe.

The Italian-made Union fau­cets are the only fau­cets available in Brushed Black Chrome or Un­lac­quered Brass.

Be cautious of the Un­lac­quered Brass fau­cets, however. This is native, raw brass without any protection against tarnish.

So unless you like the warm brown look of tarnished brass or are willing to polish the fau­cet weekly, you might want to leave umcoated brass alone.

Also, be cautious of mixing finishes across manufacturers. One company's polished nickel or matte black may not be another company's polished nickel or matte black.

Companies like do their own finishing in-house. They can mix manufacturers without the risk of finish variation.

The fau­cets arrive unfinished and the finish is applied as the fau­cets are ordered. It makes no difference who made the fau­cets, they all get exactly the same finish.

Bath­room Brands does not do its own finishing. It relies on its suppliers for finishes. Chrome across manufacturers is probably going to be an exact match. But, be careful ordering any other finish from different manufacturers sight unseen.

Knurling

Faucets in the Un­ion collection and one fau­cet in the MPRO collection are available with a surface accent.

Cross­wa­ter treats knurling as just another finish, but it is actually a surface refinement, not a finish.

Some parts of the fau­cet have a knurl machined into its surface. Most of the fau­cet, however, retains its smooth surface. Knurling as a decorative accent is showing up in an increasing number of fau­cet lines.

The Warranty

The language of the warranty at one time was a hodgepodge of obtuse legalize, written by someone with an over-fondness for the phrase "to the maximum extent permitted by law." It has been completely rewritten and is much improved. It is now written in language that is "simple and readily understood" by the average consumer as required by law.

The warranty is meets the standard for the U.S. and Canada, providing a lifetime guarantee to the original owner against defects in materials or workmanship.

But, it still has a few drafting problems and needs to be examined once again by a lawyer who better understands U.S. consumer product warranty law.

Customer Service

Crosswater has shown itself quick to resolve warranty issues. In the years it has conducted business in North America, we have not had a single complaint about the Cross­water nor has the Better Business Bureau.

In our testing of Cross­wat­er's customer service, it scored well for product knowledge, helpfulness, and candor — especially candor.

The company is very up-front about its products although customer service representatives volunteer very little. You have to ask the right questions, but if you do, you will get straightforward answers even if the answer is effectively "none of your business."

The Website

The Cross­water website is nicely organized, responds well to smartphones and tablets as well as desktop access, and is easy to navigate with clear navigation choices throughout. It allows filtering for a fau­cet by collection, feature, finish, flow rate, handle style, price, style, – or some combination of features to quickly drill down to a specific product.

However, the information provided about the fau­cets, while much more complete than is usual on a faucet company website, is still not quite adequate for a fully informed buying decision.

Downloads

A brief listing of the fau­cet's main features is displayed on a fau­cet page. This is supplemented by additional information available by scrolling down the page and clicking on a "Product Sheet PDF" to download additional specifications in .pdf format.

This is where the most useful information can be found, including certifications, the source of the faucet's valve cartridges and other details valuable to an informed faucet buyhing decision.

"Pro­duct Spe­ci­fi­ca­tion" is where we thought we would find specifications, but it displays just a measured drawing of the faucet.

"In­stal­la­tion In­struc­tions" displays the detailed installation guide in .pdf format. It is very comprehensive and easy to follow. Our plumber rated installation of our test fau­cets "Ea­sy" on a four-point scale of "Ve­ry Ea­sy" to "Ve­ry Hard".

It is also where the exploded parts diagram will be found.

Wish List

Clicking on the tab marked "Wishlist" adds the fau­cet to a list that includes an image of the fau­cet and its specifications. This feature makes it easier to compare fau­cet selections.

After a faucet has been added to the wishlist, the option, "View Wishlist" appears to display the list which includes an option to e-mail the list, making it easy to show your selections to your plumber or spouse.

The wishlist tab is a little confusing, however. It's not clear from looking at the page what clicking on the tab will do. A better label would be "Add to Wishlist", and a brief rollover instruction would be nice such as "Click here to add this product to your selections."

Still, we think this is a very clever and useful feature that more companies should copy.

Visualization

Each faucet is usually illustrated with a single 3/4 view. Although other images of the fau­cet are often available elsewhere on the website, there is no link to them from the fau­cet listing page. The only image link from the listing page is to a Pinterest gallery that is not specific to the fau­cet.

Easily-displayed multiple views would help a potential buyer better visualize a fau­cet.

Better still would be a 360° visualization capability such as that provided by faucets.

Click on a 360° icon and the fau­cet is displayed in a box that allows you to rotate the fau­cet with your mouse to view it from any angle. The feature takes the guesswork out of selecting a fau­cet from one or two static images.

When the user clicks on a finish selection, the image of the fau­cet changes to show that selected finish, and a checkmark indicates the finish that is currently selected. The feature makes it much easier to visualize the fau­cet in a selected finish.

Site Selection

The website is set up to determine whether you live in North America and if so, give you access to just the North American website.

If you want to look at the U.K. site, you are out of luck.

We had to use a proxy that to pretend we were in Scotland. Only then did Bathroom Brands give us a peek at its UK site.

This "feature" is undoubtedly intended to ensure that North American viewers end up on the correct website, but it could be implemented so that a choice of accessing the U.K. site is available. All other multinational fau­cet companies of which we are aware offer this option.

Pricing

Our shoppers found that Crosswater charges less for its luxury faucets than almost all other sellers at the luxury level. Just under 20% less on average. The higher the price of the faucet, the larger the difference.

The company does not appear to have a Minimum Advertised Pricing Policy that prevents internet sellers from drastically undercutting showroom prices. Almost certainly the Forté Group has some sort of price controls, but they do not seem to be too effective.

We found several deep discounts from Crosswaters MSRP prices, sometimes as much as 50%.

Where to buy

The faucets are sold only at Forté Group member showrooms. Some have an internet presence.

The website has a "Find a Retailer" function to locate the showroom "nearest you." But, unless yhou live in or near a major city, do not expect the reailer to be very near.

Testing & Certification

Comparable Faucets

Faucets made or assembled in Asia or Europe comparable to Cross­water in quality and warranty, but not necessarily price or style include

Conclusions

If you are restoring a vintage bathroom with a Vic­tor­ian, Ed­ward­ian, Arts & Crafts, Art Deco or Mid-century Modern decor, we think Crosswater London^® is worth a serious look.

Bath­room Brands offers at least six collections of traditional or transitional fau­cet designs that are striking and creative, a welcome addition to any bathroom. They are, on average, priced below – and sometimes very much below – the competition for essentially the same styles and quality.

We are not nearly as delighted, however, with Cross­water's contemporary fau­ets.

The best of the bunch is the contemporary Union collection. IB Rubinetterie's designers have fashioned an inspired interpretation of industrial-chic. These are handsome fau­cets. The Heir two-handle widespread fau­cet is also worth a look as is the MPRO deck-mounted faucet but only with knurling.

Bath­room Brands' other contemporary designs are largely unimpressive, lacking inspiration or excitement. We think the company can do better, infusing a little more of the design innovation and creativity that distinguishes its more traditional fau­cets.

We are continuing to research the company. If you have experience with Cross­water London fau­cets, good, bad, or indifferent, we would like to hear about it, so please contact us or post a comment below.

1. The newer fau­cet construction method, and almost certainly the wave of the future, is called "core and shell". The water channel is provided by the core components, typically consisting of copper or composite tubes that are guaranteed to be lead-free. This core is then concealed inside the decorative outer shell that provides the fau­cet's shape and style. Because it never touches water, the shell can be made of leaded brass, and because it is not subject to water pressure, it does not need to be structural and can be made of much thinner material.

   The technology is actually not all that new. Wall-mount­ed fau­cets have always been core and shell. The core (usually called the "valve") is mounted in the wall and the shell (called the "trim") conceals the core. What's new is that the technique is now being applied to fau­cets other than wall-mounts, and the core, rather than being brass is some other lead-free metal, usually copper or a zinc alloy, and some companies are experimenting with composite cores, eliminating metal entirely.

   fau­cets are already all core and shell construction with a zinc alloy shell.