Position of Pendants Above Island - translating electrician speak
CT_Newbie
10 years ago
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GauchoGordo1993
10 years agoRelated Discussions
electrician will be here in 7 hours - help!
Comments (5)"The cans are well spaced in the room and centered nicely, but is it just too precise and . . . square?!?" YIKES! That layout is good for providing an evenly-lit space -- which sounds OK, but really isn't. What you need is bright lighting over your work areas, dimmable lighting over your dining area, lighting that illuminates the contents of your upper cabinets and fridge without glaring off your countertops. This 'plain square' pattern appears to have been planned by the builder considering only his convenience, and without regard to what is needed by the cook! Really good lighting will bring you years of joy and make your whole room look 'right' in a very subtle but powerful way. So, TOTALLY without regard for what the ceiling looks like, are those cans where you need them to be? Superimpose your can locations over your cabinet diagram. - Do you have a row of can lights over your main cabinet runs with the cans positioned at approximately the edge of the countertops? (This lights the cabinet contents and countertops well without blinding glare.) Is the spacing good? (Generally every 4-5 feet.) - Do you have some extra light over your sink for washing dishes? This light needs to be able to get really bright so you can tell if things are really clean. I'm not a clean-aholic, but 'good enough' on dishes just isn't!... ;-) - Will you have extra light under your range hood or do your ceiling lights need to take care of this? You want great light over your prep counter and cooktop. - Your island is not a seating area? That certainly doesn't rule out pendants, but if it's a work area, you'll need to make sure they're bright enough to work by. - I've talked about bright lights here and here and here, but DO have some areas with slightly lower light as well. Why? Because it looks so nice to have the contrasts and makes the room so much more appealing. Take a look through some design magazines at whole-room shots and note how the rooms that feel most inviting have 'pools of light'. So for areas where you're not washing, cutting or cooking, deliberately have them a bit less bright. - Are all of these fixtures on dimmers? Or dimmer-capable? This makes a huge difference and provides 'fudge room' if you over-light. - And consider the switching also, grouping lights by purpose. It's nice to have one or two switches for cooking, one for cleaning, one for dining (if you were dining there), and one for safety (kitchen's closed for the night, so walk-through lighting). So if the 'square' meets these needs, then leave it, and don't worry about what the ceiling looks like. But if not, then spend your money here, now, getting it right....See Morelocation of recessed lights - electrician coming tomorrow am - pl
Comments (7)Right now with option 1, the walkway light is lined up with the the sink light, which makes sense (on paper anyway). I was thinking that the 100W of pendants would light the island - will the mini pendants give you the light you need or are they more decorative fixtures? Busybme make a good point about also knowing what lights go on which switches. I did my switches exactly like Sandy did but in reality, once I want one work zone on I almost always turn on the others too. In hindsight I might have been just as well off to do just one switch for the overhead fixture and one for task lighting. That way when I leave the room, I would only have to turn off one or two switches instead of going to each counter and turning them off. It's really hard to decide this upfront - you might want to do a mental "run thru" of cooking a meal and see if you can imagine yourself working the lights as part of the process....See Morewhere on the island are the pendants positioned?
Comments (4)I think it really depends on your kitchen and what other type of lighting you have. We have a huge island and the pendants are on their own separate switch. So, I chose to have mini cans installed centered over the island and switched with the main cans. And then, the three pendants pushed more over the eating bar side of things and they are offset towards that end as well. In our kitchen, they are used as accent lighting and particularly for task lighting for those sitting at the bar. Are they perfectly placed? No, but close enough since we actually wired a year and a half before we installed the kitchen anyway because we had a delay in the project - and in the meantime I redesigned the kitchen! :-) Always changing things .... I don't think there is a cut and dried answer for every kitchen. Personally, I would rather have functional light than make everything perfectly centered - unless the entire kitchen is symmetrical and that is the guiding design principal. Good Luck!...See MoreHELP!: Can Location - Garden Web versus Electrician?!
Comments (94)Rantootoo, Up until a year ago, these slim led fixtures really had harsh lighting. About a year ago, the CRI went up to 90 from 80 and thy started offering 3000k units instead of 3500. This was a game changer and you are seeing more and more fixtures in the $50 price point. I like the gimbal like fixtures too because you can adjust them. As the technology gets better, the pricing comes down on the fixtures. The only reason I would install recessed fixtures now is if I were using tunable LED lighting where you can pick your particular lighting color choice for your home. Even the tunable fixtures, have surface mount fixtures. I think recessed lights may be a thing of the past shortly. You can always sell the cans on eBay or if you bought online many will take returns on unopened fixtures. Good luck!...See Morecarree
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