Greetings!

We are in the middle of a kitchen / bath / dining room remodel and are going into it with zero experience on lighting.

Attached are pictures of the first rough draft we came up with.

Our big questions:

1. Recessed vs pendant for island - would pendant be too busy, perhaps?
2. Recessed vs window pendant for kitchen sink.
3. Pendant lighting on dining room table and dining room table size. Proportionally a 96" x 42" table would fit just about perfectly given the "virtual" wall we have in place next to the walking path, however we don't have a use case for a table that big. I also attached a mockup of a smaller 68" vs 36" table, which IMO looks way too small.
4. Any suggestionsin the way we have spacing/position for the recessed lights in both rooms?

96" x 42" dining room table


68" x 36" dining room table




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I think you're on the right track. A lot of lighting design is personal preference, so take my comments with a grain of salt.

* I would pull the recessed lights in the kitchen area a bit further away from the counters. In theory, it's nice to have them above the countertop, but I find that if they are too close to the cabinets, they cast a downlight which doesn't look great. I usually install them about 3'-4' from the wall (2-3' from the wall cabinets.)
* In the dining area, I would use 4 recessed lights. I think 3 would look odd and if you don't have the pendants on over the table, it'll be dark in that corner.
* For the table pendants, I would find a fixture that speaks to you. There are so many options, it can really be a nice focal point.
* I like pendants for an island. Again, adds some flair. I've also done MR16 recessed fixtures to give something a bit different. But from a functional standpoint, either way works. I would figure out where you want the focal point to be. Do you have some really nice cabinets that you don't want to hide - use recessed. If you want the focus on the island area, pick some nice colored pendants.
* Same with the sink light. Doesn't much matter. Some people like task lights at the sink. I tend to not use them - the recessed lights are enough for me.

Also think about how you're going to switch all these lights. Dimmers are highly recommended. If you're a technical person, it's a good opportunity to use controlled switches and set scenes 'Dinner', or 'Party' to make certain areas pop.

Hope this helps!

 

Lighting is very personal. It not only needs to be effective it needs to look smart and be liked.

I agree with four recessed lights in the dining room. They need to look even.
I'm not a fan of pendants over a dining room table. I prefer one dedicated fixture.... chandelier.
Pendants over the kitchen island are nice.
Small LED strip over the sink supplies lots of light with minimal visual impact.
What's a wall pendant ?

I would love to put under cabinet lighting in my kitchen but my cabinets are made of Formica and have no recess or reveal on the bottom to hide the lights. I don't want to see any surface fixtures. Keep under cabinet lighting in mind if that's something that excites your or the missus.

 

I appreciate the feedback Zorfdt and Pete!

*Good catch on the wall pendant, I was burnt out for the day and had meant to type "Wall fixture"

*We updated our design to go with four recessed lights in the dining room, that makes complete sense.

*I work in the IT field, so a controlled dimmer with scenes sounds amazing.

We'll take a deeper look at under the cabinet lighting, great call making sure your cabinets have a recess on the bottom to hide themWould one benefit of having a single pendant over the dining room table be that you wouldn't have anything in line with the windows? I'm in the country and those windows face the west, so I'm thinking the view wouldn't be obstructed as much.

 

I would do as Zorfdt suggested by moving the cans in the kitchen away from the counters and install LED strip lights under the cabinets. This will give you the lighting you need on the counters.

I would then put 5 cans spaced around the island. A well lit kitchen is always a good thing and with a dimmer, you can control the lighting output. (note: light locations for reference only)

 

Here is the latest rendition of my design.

*moved the cans in the kitchen away from the counters per the suggestions and installed LED strip lights under the cabinets
*went to a single rectangular chandelier over the dining room table
*added additional cans in the dining room evenly spaced out so everything is symmetrical
*added the under the cabinet lighting

A co-worker who just built a house recommended we also strongly think about adding a couple wall sconces along the west wall between the windows. I put those in as red rectangles.

Again, thanks to everyone for the suggestions!

 

Looks good.

I would add two additional wall sconces next to the windows to even out the symmetry and to balance the lighting on that side of the room. Put all the sconces on a dimmer for mood lighting and/or use indirect fixtures. Mount them high enough and you will still have room for art work or pictures.

 

The manufacturers have recommended spacing which uses overlapping light-cones spaced such that the light is even as you move through the area. As you leaved one cone the intensity decreases from that cone, but at the same time increases from the next cone so that the overall lighting is fairly constant from location to location.

As was mentioned it’s all personal preference though, and you are supplementing the down-lighting, and no law says the light has to be even all through the room. You can make trade-offs. Just my 2 cents.

 

Personal opinion, that's a LOT of recessed lights. Granted, some people like it bright and well-lit. I just walked through a new renovation down the road and it was lit similarly to this with 5000K (bright white) 4" recessed lights. So it seems to be the modern thing to do, but if it were my house, I'd cut the number in half.

Sconces are a nice addition too for that side of the room. I'm less of a fan, but again, totally personal opinion.

 

Zorfdt -

Don’t want to hijack 396ss’s thread, but funny you should mention that lighting. I just put one of those 5000K bulbs in one of my 4” recessed a few days ago– and I don’t like it. It really looks like daylight so you would think that would be something you would like – seems like more natural daylight. But I don’t. I guess it’s as the folks on the thread are saying – it’s personal preference.

 

Give it some time and you may not notice it. I had a similar situation with a 60W equivalent non- removable LED in a fan/light fixture and hated it so much at first that I tried blocking, taping, etc. (everything but a dimmer) to reduce the light level and change the color. Eventually I gave up and after a couple of months it does not bother me at all. I also changed all the other bulbs in the bathroom to LEDs so the colors match and that helped.

As I have stated in other threads, I generally prefer lower light levels.

 

I forgot to mention the obvious: LED bulbs are available in lower color temps. 2700K is warm white similar to incandescent bulbs. Higher temps range up to 5000K "daylight".

 

I'm also not a fan of sconces but I agree with 2john02458. Just be sure to look at sconces before you wire them in. They can get quite pricey fast.

 

@396 –

Just remembered a rule of thumb for kitchen lighting that I came across when I was doing mine. If I remember correctly, if you have an eat in kitchen there should be enough light at the kitchen table to be able to sit down and do your bills there. It seems to me anyway, that would apply to your island – and it looks like you already have that covered. But I thought I’d just mention that anyway, might help a little.

@2john –

I agree, probably a good idea to wait a little while before you pronounce judgment on a lighting change.