Designing with Light |
Kitchens
 TODAY’S
KITCHEN is the household hub or “command center.”
As a gathering place, a kitchen needs flexible lighting for
both late-night snacks and full-scale entertaining. And whether
there’s one cook or a crew of kitchen helpers at work,
task lighting for the sink, countertops, and cooktop is essential.
Multiple sources and dimmer controls lets you turn light up
full throttle when you’re working or down to a warm glow
after hours.
You’ll want
strong, shadowless light right over each kitchen work area.
In most cases, shielded strip lights under the cabinets- hidden
behind a trim strip of valance – are the best way to
light counter areas. Downlights effectively illuminate the
sink and work islands.
Surface mounted fixtures, once a kitchen
mainstay, are now used specifically to draw attention to themselves.
Hanging pendants are especially popular, place them over a
breakfast nook or an island – or anywhere they won’t
present a traffic hazard.
Fluorescent tubes are unrivaled for
energy efficiency; they also last longer than incandescent
bulbs. In some energy-conscious areas, general lighting for
new kitchens must be fluorescent. Though fixture options for
fluorescent bulbs and tubes are limited, indirect treatments
using them are popular: the tubes are placed in soffits atop
cabinets or in overhead coves.
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Kitchen task lighting
is often delivered by means of under-cabinet strip lights. Here
they're sealed and softened within frosted acrylic panels on
cabinet bottoms. |
The
owner of this kitchen, part of a remodeled winery, wanted lots
of light, but the raised ceiling made it a tough task. Stylish
red Italian pendants housing tiny but efficient quartz bulbs
solved the problem and defined the space. Electrical conduit,
painted white, leads from the roofline down to the fixtures,
which were designed to be ceiling-mounted. |
An eclectic, casual kitchen sports casual, "unfitted" lighting to match, including two chain-hung glass pendants, table lamps, and even a jaunty string of Christmas lights. Sure, it's less efficient than some schemes, but it's more fun.
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Three glass-and-chrome pendants follow the line of the butcher-block prep island. Downlights mark the rear countertop; decorative uplights in high cabinet soffits add background fill. |
A hollow central "beam" houses recessed downlights and follows the work surfaces of a hard-working island, shining strong quartz lighting where it's most needed. Track fixtures supply the general lighting; tucked along open ceiling beams, they were custom-colored to blend with the surroundings
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While many designer chafe against energy requirements
that demand fluorescents in kitchens, the architect of this
space reveled in the look-finding them the perfect touch for
a retro 50s design. Overhead lighting is flaunted, courtesy
of a 36-inch, soffit-mounted ceiling globe. Tubes behind wall
cabinets graze the concrete-block wall, and more tubes bounce
light off the painted wood ceiling. The lighting is classic "cool" fluorescent throughout. |
Need to add light where there's limited overhead access? These surface-mounted, low-voltage track fixtures include integral transformers and add a gleaming look to a high-tech kitchen. Just be sure your cabinet doors will clear the tracks you choose!. |
Kitchen
schems rarely feature purely decorative effects, but this one
fills the bill. Incandescent mini-tracks run through the soffit
area above the wall cabinet, back-lighting bundled dried twigs.
This provides enough ambient light to negotiate the kitchen
at night when other sources are switched off. |
No, it's not the War of the World, just fluorescents metting the future. Except for the trio of tiny pendants hovering near the eating counter; all ceiling fixtures here house space-saving PL-fluorescent tubes. |
Undercabinet
task lighting doubles here as accent light, show-casing a bold
glass mosaic backsplash.
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