What are you painting your ceilings? I have two color walls, one color on my bakers table, my floors are porcelain that look like wood, my cabinets will be QS white oak. I painted my ceiling and trim a whiteish color called Greek Villa. It (IMHO) looks fantastic... even though it's currently just the ceiling since we havne't put trim up yet.

Trim:
Traditionally, trim and moulding is used to unify the theme and appearance of the entire house. You need to step back and think through the trim work. What is that you want to convey with the trim work? Do you want the kitchen to stand out architecturally from the rest of the house? Do you want the kitchen to blend in? Once you paint the wood, you cannot bring back the wood grain. So you need to take that into consideration...

Typically, stain grade trim work costs a lot more than paint grade trim work. Certain wood species cost more than others. Even for the same specie of wood, there are "select" grades which cost more.

We ended up returning trim and buying extra wood because some of the wood was not up to my standard.. The lumber yard charges you a stocking fee!) Well done trim work is quite expensive!

In my house, I have trim from 9 years ago, 5 years ago and now. We are using fir. So the wood colors are all different even though they are all the same species of wood. Fir darkens over time. So we have that hodgy podgy look. I am hoping that in 10 years, all the fir will be the same "darkness". I think that is a part of the charm of stain-grade wood.

Hang in there. This is why things become over budget... We don't know all these things before we start. Just take a deep breath and this too shall pass.

I have 8 cans in a kitchen that is 14ft x 15ft. I have undercabinet lights and range hood lights on 1 wall only. The other wall has no cabinets or extra lights. They are more than enough lights. I have no pendants over the island by choice. Typically recessed lights are rated for 75W. 6 can lights are 300W of lighting. This is A LOT of light!

I chose orderly appearance of the lights in the ceiling because the recessed lights are ugly enough as is. I did not want to add to the general unattractiveness of these lights. I did not want to pay for Italian made sleek modern ceiling mounted light fixtures in lieu of recessed lights that cost $200 to $400 each! (at times, I wish I had!)

Get good reflective trim and bulbs for the recessed lights. This will help with the light.

the ceiling? I have to decide what color to paint the ceiling, too?????? AAAEEEEYYYY! No seriously...I guess it'll be white...does that mean that even though the rest of the room is seriously not white...white trim will be OK?
To get an idea of the kind of colors/look I'm going for I'm attaching a link to an inspiration kitchen...only I don't have the white farmhouse sink . Ohh....or think of circuspeanuts kitchen or Lpolks.

Here is a link that might be useful: to give you an idea of the look

I'm no expert but we do have several types of recessed lighting in the house. The first is a simple can that shoots light out in a straight line, and the second is one with something I think they call a bug eye. Basically we can adjust the bulb to aim it at a slightly different angles as necessary. This might be helpful for you. Get the lighting close and then tweak it if it is off. See if your contractor or DH knows what I'm talking about.

As for the trim - do you know how much extra they are talking about with the stained trim? When my contractor told me that "this is going to cost a lot extra" my knees got weak. I then found out that his idea of a lot is not mine and so I quickly told him to go ahead with his plans. If it was me, I think I would go with your original vision and keep the consistency of the trim throughout the house. BTW - your description of the kitchen sounds lovely (made me stop and wonder about my cabinet choices, now I'm still wondering).

In the kitchen you posted on the link, the window trim is stained darker which makes the windows stand out more. If you liked that, I think you should try to match the trim in the rest of your house as much as possible. OTOH, if you don't want the windows to stand out, match your walls. Lots of people don't have matching trim throughout their homes. From your description, I think I would either stain them or match the walls--I wouldn't go white since you don't have white trim anywhere else.

Sorry but I don't have any advice regarding the lighting. Good luck with your choices--I'm sure your kitchen will look great!

Don't feel bad. Our remodel came to a complete halt for almost 9 months while I held out for what I wanted on trim vs what DH wanted.

We have an old house with pine sashes and QS oak trim. The new kitchen windows are pine with soon to be QS trim. We decided against matching exactly to the cabinets and are trying to match as much as reasonably posssible to the rest of the trim in the house. We don't have a hodge podge, it's either QS or some painted trim so it's a little more straight forward. Pine window sashes are pretty standard so it's not something that sticks out.

If the rest of the oak is QS I would only put QS oak trim up or paint it. I don't think you would be happy with regular oak. My husband thought it would be too expensive but when we finally quoted it from a local mill the QS ended up being cheaper than oak pieces from HD. Perhaps if he had asked for the quote last year, my kitchen would be done, but I digress.

As for lighting, I would focus on putting lights where you need them, (I think mine are the 21" out that you talked about) and without generating shadows. They actually will make their own pattern and won't look so random and disorganized.

If the rest of your house is stained trim, I'd be going that way- for sure. Esp considering your inspiration kitchen. Should the GC have caught that your trim was stained in general - maybe- but it should have been specified as its unusual. I LOVE stained trim, I grew up in an old house with all solid mahogany windows, trims, doors, etc- miss that in my lovely 1989 suburb house now!

But its just trim, its not going to be a zillion dollars.

As for your lights, my GC is currently trying to talk me into ambiance lighting- which he says lights up everything under counter. I am about to GW-google it! But I would be functional with lights. I have to work out my own plan (tomorrow electrician here actually!) so I will soon be obsessed too but I couldnt tell you ANYTHING about anyone I knows recessed lights so in all my years I never noticed. So you might as well be functional. Except on the pendants, I'd center those over the whole island.

thank you all for your words of advice and comfort....I'm trying not to panic.

This project has been SO stressful...taking months longer than it should, a GC who has been largely absent and not paying attention, subcontractors who do good work but who make all kinds of assumptions that turn out to be NOT what I want and two hungry teenage boys who haven't had a good home-cooked meal in months. After my last renovation, I thought...well that's not so bad! This time, I think it'll take a lifetime to recover my equanimity.

I guess I'm just going to have take my best guesses on the lighting. wish I had not trusted the GC and electrician, but had consulted a lighting designer.

Melissa, just found your post, I hope it's not too late. Last week I was in the same situation with the lighting. I had a guy come over from a lighting store and help figure out placement of all lights. Somehow, it never looks the same on the plans, so I was glad he could come to the site. Apparently, lots of lighting stores will do it at no charge, if you buy lights from them. Good luck and hang in there, it will be worth it in the end.

I'm so sorry you are feeling so stressed. I understand that feeling of nothing to do then all of a sudden it seems that decisions had to be made yesterday. Even with trying to plan so much out ahead of time, some things just can't or don't get taken care of ahead of time. I was kind of in that quandry regarding lighting. It was one of those things I put off hoping that I would see the "Perfect" light. I finally had to start looking seriously and still had trouble picking out what I liked. So many things were "nice". Finally found a style I liked that would work and ordered them.

I wanted to use a lighting designer because I knew I needed a little help figuring out how much light was enough. It was my previous experience with general contractor and electrician that made me aware that they aren't necessarily helpful in that respect. Even though it sounds like you have your lighting already, I would still try to talk to a designer about your concerns. Some lighting stores may do that for free, even if you don't purchase from them.

Can lights put out a fair amount of light but when centered over walkways the majority is going to end up being behind you when you stand at the counter. I went with under cabinet lighting to help with that. My island is 50" by 72" and I am planning 3 pendants with 100 watt bulbs each. The lighting designer suggested placing them a few inches closer to the seating area side than the other prep side. That will put them in a line just off of center. I'm not sure if it really matters but I thought maybe it would be more aesthetically pleasing if they weren't dead on center.

Regarding trim, we have a similar situation in that our existing trim is 22 year old oak, natural which has yellowed over the years. The new cabinets are lyptus stained quite dark, almost a chocolate cherry look. The cabinets will have molding at the ceiling to match. The big dining room window is framed by cabinets and so I think we have to match the window trim to the cabinets there. Do we match the trim at the sink window with the cabinets or leave it match the rest of the house? The baseboard trim is also a concern. We decided to go natural with the new red oak floors to try to match existing oak trim but I would have preferred a stain to make the floor a little darker. That, however, would mean a third wood color and still wouldn't match the rest of the house. Who really thinks about all these little details before you pick your cabinet colors? You just figure it will all work out and then you are stuck thinking, how will I make this all work together. Yikes.

Sorry, I ramble. I would avoid painting the trim white. As someone else said, it really wouldn't look right, being the only white thing. I could see maybe painting it to match the green cabinets but think staining would be best. Especially with the style/look you are going for. Definitely find out exactly how much more it is going to cost. I'm not sure if regular oak or quartersawn oak trim will make much difference in cost or look, but I would look into both options so you know if there is much difference. Good luck, soon it will be over and you will be loving it!

Melissastar, I have followed several of your stressed out posts and just want to send you some cyber hugs. I identify SOOO much with what you are going through, especially nothing happening for eons and then suddenly we need to drop everything and make crucial long lasting decisions right now about stuff we haven't given thought to. If it's any consolation, I am miserable right here with you!

What did you do with your lighting?

I met with both a kitchen designer and a lighting designer about our lighting and once I saw the cans and fixtures placed in real life-I still had the electrician change/move things 3 separate times!

Main idea-theoretically cans should disappear and you won't notice them day to day, especially if you have decorative fixtures (like your island pendants) to draw the eye.

Briefly:

Lighting designer (LD) advocated placing cans for function as you describe, just a few inches in from edge of counter to light work area (in addition to undercabinet lighting), but in our kitchen layout created more of a hodge podge look to me and, I feared, actually overlit one corner of the kitchen. She advocated all 5" cans for uniformity.

Kitchen designer (KD) advocated placing fewer cans spaced out in a walkway row, telling me that undercabinet lights (and under hood lights) would be providing the primary task lighting at countertop. He advocated 5" cans for perimeter and 4" cans for more focused task lighting at the island (where we'll have a prep sink and be doing most of our meal prep.)

Perhaps ironically, we went with KD's lighting suggestions over LD's, primarily bc we have an old house and I really didn't want to have so many cans in the kitchen (LOL) and didn't want the random polka dots in the ceiling to call more attention to themselves. I hope our kitchen won't be underlit, but should it be, I guess that would actually be in keeping with our old house.

Your dilemma about the island pendants is seriously why I decided to not do them (LOL.) I would urge you to consider what is around them--i.e. what "view" are your pendants framing? Obviously you want your task and eating areas to be well lit, but personally this is where I'd lean towards form over function. I haven't seen your whole kitchen to know for sure, but I'd guess if you have walkway cans that are 5-6" size, you might be able to get away with centering your pendants on your pennisula. Sometimes I see people placing island pendants purely for function and they just look odd to me. They are there to also be a decorative element.

My lighting compromise was to overlight our island which is 58x80--minus a corner cut off for walkway--which will have 5 4" cans. I was choosing between doing that or one big schoolhouse fixture centered on the island (which would underlight it) and went for the overlit since that is our main prep area.

Hope you are doing better today!

hockeychic, littlesmokie, et al: Thank you so much for the support. When I started this reno, I didn't worry much about the stress. I'd been through an even more extensive renovation before when my son was 9 and survived it without too much stress. This time, my son was actually out of the country and I thought...piece of cake, it'll all be done before he returns! Fat chance. He (now 17) has been back for nearly 3 months and we're still weeks from finishing.
And that's assuming that the cabinet maker comes through. Other subs on the job keep snickering and mentioning Christmas whenever his name comes up...bad sign.

Another day went by today with no work being done...apparently the bad rain storms we had yesterday have the plumber fixing sump pumps in wet basements and the carpenters/drywall guys working on some other emergencies. They promise to show up tomorrow though. Keeping my fingers crossed.

The good news is that it seems the GC has finally reappeared and focused on this job again. We spent an hour or two working out the the dining room/kitchen transition (different height ceilings, walls padded out with new studs, wallboard and insulation in the kitchen). Now if I can only figure out what to do with the 12" gap between the old dining room floor and the new kitchen floor....

I ended up reworking the lighting to put at cans over the two main counter areas, pulling them from the walkways. then put another one in the center of the room...between them they should light both the counters and the walkways now...but they may look very spotty since I was sort of guessing what to do and trying to work around the pipes and studs already in place.

And I've concluded that the trim does need to be stained. I suppose the jamb extensions will be pine, matching the sashes, but the trim around the outside will be plain oak, matching what's in the dining room.

Again....thanks to all who offered support and advice. It's really appreciated.

Hang in there. You are making progress and it sounds like you will be getting to the painting wall stage soon. Guess I missed stuff about the cabinet maker. Are there questions about whether your cabinets will be done in time?

Huge questions. It's one of the many things weighing on me, but I didn't outline it as one of the immediate crises in my post. The cabinets were "ordered" at least 4 months ago...but it was understood that the order wouldn't be finalized and cabinets started until the demo'd and extended kitchen was framed out, so that we would know exactly what dimensions we were dealing with. That was 6 weeks ago and they were theoretically supposed to be finished now. But in the months I have been acquainted with the cabinet maker he has experienced the following:

Two truck break-ins, stealing all of his tools (he often works in dubious neighborhoods, so it's not unheard of).

A hernia, requiring hospitalization for several days and then a longish recovery period

Some sort of intestinal parasite which took him out of commission for at least a week.

Lost keys to his workshop.

A fire at his part-time job.

And a long litany of other things. All of which, I actually do believe happened and none of which were his fault, but which nevertheless added days or weeks to the timetable, each time. Remember that character in the Lil Abner comic strip with the black cloud over his head...that's Bob.

Meanwhile, he swears that in two weeks at least the lower boxes will be done so that the counter top can be installed.
I'm dubious.

Thanks for asking and for the supportive words.