We sometimes use our dining table for other than dining, like homework, jigsaw puzzles, sewing machine etc, a larger diameter light would illuminate a lot better for these activities.
You can always dim a light fixture if it's too bright!
For me, I prefer the smaller, diameter pendant lighting over an island!
Personal choice... good luck!

Our island is 65 inches X 30 inches - smaller than yours. We have two pendants, similar in style to your first choice above, and they look **awesome**:

http://www.restorationhardware.com/rh/catalog/product/product.jsp?productId=prod740064&navCount=1

They are 14" and we thought they would be too big, but even with our 8 foot ceilings, they look great.

We did consider the 10" Hinkleys - they are a nice looking pendant.

The big thing that sold us on the Restoration Hardware pieces is that they have a lens covering the bottom of pendant. So there are no bare bulbs there staring you in the face. This mutes and spreads the light, and overall, just looks a lot better.

Plus, the bigger lights hold two bulbs each, so we've got 400 watts shining down on our granite. We paid for that, we want to see it!

It looks like your island is 2.5' x 8.5' right? I think the 2 large ones would work fine, and provide better lighting than the row of mini's.

I love the last 2 mini's, but I think they might be too big to cluster like the stars. I hope you can work them in somewhere.

Not the best picture to showcase the lights, but it's all I've got right now.

FYI, the bottoms of the lights are about 37" above the top of the island, and about 6 foot 1" or 6 foot 2" from the floor.

OMG... vate ... what cool granite!!!

I'm in love with the circular swirly mini jsw.

What a great treat to put the kids to bed, have dinner w/ DH (with a side of dust) and come back to find some great helpful answers!

Emily, you are right about it being a personal choice. We homeschool as well but will not be using this table so much for school work. Being able to have ambient lighting at the table is a higher priority for us, but our new cans may still give pretty good light at the table when combined with whatever we put over it.

Thank you, vate, for all the information and picture. That granite. Is. Amazing. I have never seen anything like it! Your kitchen is beautiful too. We are taking out cabinets that are the same color as yours. It didn't work to keep and refinish them because our layout is completely different, but I have always loved the color. I saw your pendants at RH for the first time today (maybe you posted it on another thread which made me go look). Don't know how I've missed them all this time. They look great over your island. I tend toward more traditional style and those lights could fit well with just about any style, I think. I'm glad to hear about the effect of the bottom lens.

Since I first posted I found this light at Hudson Valley. Currently it comes with 8" or 15" glass, but they have 12" still available that have been discontinued. I am now thinking of 3 of these over the island with 12" glass. They are a little more moderate in size but each can take a 100W bulb, so light would be ample over the island.

I agree that the Eden and Atlantis would not work in a cluster. The WAC catalog actually has a very cool picture of the Clarity in a cluster in some commercial building. At first I liked Eden best, but the more I look at it, the more Clarity sticks with me. I may try to use one of the other two elsewhere in the house.

We had our cans put in today, and DH put bulbs in all of them when he got home. It is so bright! When we bought the house and remodeled 15 years ago we only put in 5 plus a light over the sink and one bad one over the table. As of today, we have 12 cans; when the kitchen is finished we will also have the pendants and a sink light. Plus new much larger windows.)

{{gwi:1640716}}
Table pendant will be where blue circle is in front of bump out (where the chair is in the photo)

Thanks everyone!

Thanks for the kind comments on the granite. It is Cinderella Blue from Brazil. When we found the slabs, they single-handedly caused us to change our countertop budget.

More cans = more light. People get hung up about placement but once your kitchen is done, nobody ever notices the can lights, unless the place is too dark.

I think three 12" lights would work well for your large island. I'm glad I don't have to line them up. I installed ours, and even getting two, perfectly positioned with respect to the island, and in a perfect line, was much harder than I thought.

If you decide to look again at the Restoration Hardware lights, look on their web site for their outlet stores. There is one about an hour from us (north of Atlanta), and we got a great deal on the lights - over 60% off.

Great design! Have you seen pendant light from PROGRESS they have 3 different sizes. I think they would be in your taste and very similar to those in the pictures.
Good luck

Thank danielle, and thank you all for the input. Our lighting guy directed me to Progress to look up that particular pendant, but I haven't spent much time there yet. I will go back and look carefully. I'm pretty sure we will be going with the Edison, but we have a little time; they won't cut the ceiling until the cabinets are in.