Nickel but I'd choose the satin nickel cuz satin works better with dust. :)

IMO, ORB is tomorrow's 'antique brass'. I'd tire of it much sooner than a classic finish. And, I'd want to throw it out rather than re-purpose it for another room--perhaps over a bath vanity. And because the lights are pricey, it would be a major Ouch for me to toss them.

Do you have any pictures? That always helps. What color is the oak island? I am interested to hear what people say about the height of pendants. You could probably do a google search for recommendations on this.

worldmom, hopefully some of the KD's here will chime in because they probably know more than I do, but since I"ve just spent the better part of two weeks choosing pendants, I will tell you that both what I read and what I was told by lighting companies was that a pendant over a peninsula or island is recommended to hang in about the 6 foot high area...I didn't take that to be an exact rule, just sort of a rule of thumb that helped me get comfortable. In the end I ordered the one for over our peninsula to hang to about the 6'2" level and the ones in front of windows over counters and sink to hang at about 6'6" since people will be working directly under them. Hope that helps.

FWIW, I never tired of my antique brass, and used ORB this time around. Get what you like, unless you have to consider resale.

Anne

I have a large island pendant and 3 small pendants over 2 islands in my kitchen. I have Greek bronze from Maxim and it is not as dark as orb but I love it and have had them almost 2 years now. I have them on dimmers and could not imagine not having that feature! Here are some pics!

I chose the nickel for our kitchen so the fixture would be more subtle. It still can be there and be beautiful, but not catch the eye and provide the contrast that the darker color would. I thought, too, that it would be easier to update or change the personality of the kitchen decor with a less obvious color.

Like Ci lantro, I found ORB to be way too ubiquitous and trendy, and preferred something different. Not that nickel isn't ubiquitous, but it's more of a 'white T-shirt' thing that will blend better over time. In our case, they also related better to the hardware and lighting we used throughout the house, which were antique pewter and black.

I think I remember rule of thumb for pendants to hang 30-36" above the surface...but the scale of the fixtures will make a difference, too, I think. I think smaller ones could hang lower while I'd want larger ones higher.

Thanks for the feedback, everyone. I appreciate it! :o)

I'm not too worried about ORB being a potentially trendy finish as we have some rather dark original hardware/fixtures in our 99 year old home, and we've purchased other Rejuvenation fixtures in that finish for this reason. (In fact, we have the exact ORB fixture below in the sitting room of our bedroom, but with a different shade.) I'm just having a hard time envisioning what the two options will look like with all our other choices.

Kelleg - I pulled these from the Rejuvenation site since it would let me see renderings of them in either finish, but this wouldn't be the exact fixture. The shade would be the same. They give you the general idea.

The last picture is what our island will look like, except ours will be topped with carrara marble. Do any of these pictures make you lean one way or the other? {{!gwi}}From Last Import
{{!gwi}}From Last Import

My advice is:

Buy whatever colour or finish you think is beautiful. It is very difficult to "design by committee". If you buy things that you think are beautiful and assemble them, chances are that they will work nicely together. There are some basic rules regarding colour and space, but that's about it.

Personally - I hate sitting at a table or island and trying to peer around/over/or through a light fixture. I think they are best when they are above eye level of a person standing upright - so about 6'6".

Put as many dimmers in your house as you possibly can. Lighting is something that a lot of people don't pay enough attention to and it has an amazing effect on decor and the moods of people..