Thanks for the input. My kitchen absolutely needs an island and my drawing may be deceiving because it’s not to scale. The wall between the kitchen and dining room that we just blew out used to have kitchen cabinets, oven range, and counter tops. With the wall gone I need to relocate the oven range to be next to the fridge and get my storage and counter tops back with the island. There is at least 42 in of clearance on all sides of the island except between the fridge and the side wall. Based on my research 42 in is plenty for two people. I am still open to suggestions and I have not hired a KD but open to the idea.

Follow up question. Will the 3000k appear yellowish? The CRI is 95. When I looked in the store it didn't seem yellowish--I just wasn't sure next to the white cabinets. Thanks!

That electrician was blowing smoke. Remodel cans don't cause the drywall to sag. It would be pointless to rip down the drywall to install "new contruction" cans. The only time to use those is in new construction or if you are removing the drywall for some other reason. Otherwise, it's just needless damage and work. Maybe he just doesn't like to be careful about damaging drywall or putting excessive holes in the walls/ceiling when running the wiring, so he uses this 'excuse' to justify his "bull in a china shop" technique.

Denise Marchand - thank you for all of your suggestions! We took your suggestion to move the refrigerator to the wall with the other tall cabinets but are keeping the sink and dishwasher in the locations on my original plan - this allows us to have a corner cabinet. We are using ikea cabinets so we are limited to 15" and 24". We are planning on using a gloss, white subway tile for the open walls (full wall) and back splash on the cabinet wall. We also switch to solid oak counters throughout. Do the window's it is hard to add shelving on either side of the sink. Once the wall is bumped out to even it out with the other side to cover the plumbing stack, the wall to the left of the sink only has 5/6"s of depth before the window. We may add open shelving above the dishwasher on the same wall as the tall cabinets and a high open shelf along the wall with the stove as well. We're going to wait till cabinets and counters are up before we make any decisions about adding open shelving. Since we eliminated the wall cabinets we also switched around the light plan. (below). With a 2nd row, we dropped down to 4" lights from the 6". We are somewhat constrained by the water pipes/stack and AC vents that run through ceiling. The tall cabinets will also have counter task lights. The box outline matches which switch they are attached to. We'll will make sure both sets are dimmable. Debating if it make more sense to only have 2 lights in the hall...If we add another light above the dishwasher, it could only be 10" from the wall. Since we eliminated the wall cabinets we also switched around the light plan. See attached. Since we added another row, we are dropping down to 4" lights from the 6". We are somewhat constrained by the water pipes and AC vents that run through ceiling. The tall cabinets will also have counter task lights. The box outline matches which switch they are attached to. We'll will make sure both sets are dimmable.