Loving this discussion! My not so favorite comment and one that would get you wasted in no time flat are the variants of "This is a complete gut job" spoken about kitchens and bathrooms. And then there is the dreaded "cookie-cutter" home which no young person wants anything to do with of course. I'm also puzzled that every single buyer has to have an office. Ok, I get that some people do work from home. But it's a universal demand...I mean, are there that many folks who must have a separate complete room to make some phone calls and noodle on their laptop??? The entertaining requirement is a mystery, especially when people are moving to another city...state...country. Just exactly who are these hordes of people you are going to be hosting in a place you've lived in for 2 weeks? I've also grown to expect that they will choose the one house with the fatal flaw, or which is the complete opposite of the style they loudly have said is the only one they will consider. Looking for a modern townhome? Well, guess the suburban ranch is really the one for me! That house that backs up to the freeway? Why that's our dream home, forget about the cottage with the only noise being the babbling brook outside and the birds singing. And the international shows, well I can't help but suspect that the realtor asks the budget, then throws a dart at a board, takes them to whatever hovel it hits on and *surprise* the price is the sucker...um, foreign buyer's budget amount. Really, they will roll up to some dump that is literally falling down with Americans in tow, and with a straight face intone 'and the price is $400,000'. Special props, lord love em, to the American housewives whose husbands have been transferred to wherever and who wander around repeating 'this kitchen/bathroom/bedroom/yard is so much smaller than what we had in 'Murica". And the poor sap guy is always worriedly telling the camera that he has to go along with the missus because she has made such a sacrifice coming to live in wherever. Even if wherever is Paris, Copenhagen, Singapore or other vibrant cosmopolitan cultural center instead of Plano or Cleveland where they hailed from! And yet, I keep recording them and watching them so I'm guilty of supporting this (literal) cottage industry... Ann

Hello. I'm installing led tape light in a number of tray ceilings to achieve a warm glow around each tay ceiling's perimeter. Can someone help me with determining what the target brightness (lumens/FT) should be for such an application (main ceilings are 10 FT with the recessed ceilings being about 12" higher than the trays where the 2700K LED tape will reside). I'm seeing some at 120 lumens/ft and 240 lumens/ft. If 240 lumens/ft is the desired brightness tape, would I want to use a dimmable driver or do you think there would be little need to dim the cove lighting (i.e., is 240 lumens/ft quite bright or not so much)? Thank you

@suezbell Yes this is a good point and I think part of the problem - the entryway is one place where I'd really like to have the cozy darker fixture but it adjoins the living room with no doorways in between, and the LR then adjoins the dining room. So I worry that it would look mismatched to have the same stretch of ceiling with different finishes. Hmmm.... The hallways may be a good place to have darker fixtures, though the downstairs hallway runs off the DR with all the silver/chrome fixtures (though there's a doorway breaking up the line of the ceiling)

You guys are right - I'm installing recessed lighting. But I see an opportunity for some visual interest to do something different over the sink, and I don't think that would increase the $$ significantly. So I'm thinking two recessed lights over the countertop on the right where the stove is and then perhaps three on the side of the sink, including one pendant over the sink and one recessed to either side. I've been looking at various photos but most show pendants over and island which I don't have. Do you think something like this would be task oriented enough? We have a westelm outlet nearby and they have some of these...