Here's what I have:
--Tech LIghting Monorail light system (3 "Inner Fire" pendants and 2 "tinkerbell" spot light heads directed to the prep and cooking area)

--several 5-inch recessed lights (the two over the sink are "eyeball" lights that are focused on the sink area)

--Sylvania "warm white" fluorescent under cabinet strips

I love the layers of light, we're very happy with our choices.

My kitchen is open to the family room so I just wanted one big-ish light. My kitchen is all DIY except counters so lower budget on lighting was a must. I bought a foyer light online as my kitchen is small but tall and foyer lighting fit better. The rest of the lighting is recessed and the undercab LCD's are the same low profile type that environmental lighting sells except I got mine on ebay for a fraction of the cost.

Sharonite - Tech Lighting seems to be a line that I keep coming across in my searching. I want to lean slightly contemporary and they seem to have a great selection in that style. I would have never thought of the track system with different options along it. I really like that alot!

jterrilyn - are those outlet strips up under your cabinet so you don't have outlets in your backsplash? Clever, very clever. I may have to do that.

My contractor was suggesting LED puck type lights under the cabinets (for longevity and to match the uppers) but it seems that most have the strip type. I think that the strip type would provide a more "uniform" look.

We have turquoise pendant lights from Bruck lighting that we purchased through a local store. The ones over the island and the sink are halogen and the ones over the bar are LED. We also have LED under cabinet lights.

I love our lights. We went through (too) many iterations of lights before finally deciding on the Brucks. The only thing I would do differently would be to have the light over the sink be an LED. It really doesn't need to be halogen.

I forgot to say that one of the features of our lighting that I like the most is that everything is on a dimmer! I like it VERY bright when I'm cooking, DH was a vampire in an earlier life and likes muted light (he claims he feels like he's in an interrogation room when I have all the lights on). This way everyone can be happy and we can create multiple moods through lighting.

leela, it's good to see someone else with 5 pendants. Your photo and this one might be helpful to someone else who's dithering about multi-pendant lighting.

We were wondering if we were nuts to go with so many, but store assured us we were not. I was determined to have a "bell" light in each of the front windows of the house, to be seen from the street and these have worked out well. Yes we could have put a second pendant over that big sink so the lights didn't coincide with the mullion, but that would have put six pendants into the kitchen (there's one to the left of the one you can see over the peninsula). Haven't seen a photo with that!

Only regret on these is that I don't know how to un-spider my world. We live on a lake and I feel that winter months really bring a lot of wildlife into the house. Cobwebs collect between the rungs of the twists on chrome trim of lights. Am very very happy that we didn't choose a clear glass--dusting five of these every week or so is as much as I care to do. [Quoizel "Denmark"]

I just had my ucl led's put in today

Jterrilynn, I think those are some I have bookmarked, but the single tier. Do you like the clear glass over your island? It looks really nice in your kitchen.

Oh gosh, you guys with the 5+ pendants are scaring me! I will go broke if I need that many. I am currently thinking of two over the island (it is small) and one for over the sink. I hadn't given that much thought to LED vs halogen. Is the benefit that the LED is longer lasting (albeit more expensive)?

For those with LED undercabinet lights, are yours pucks or the strip type? My contractor is recommending that I ask about a false shelf under the cabinets so the wires are hidden. Is that necessary?

I should really let my husband deal with the technicalities of the electrical work.

12" school house style lights from rejuvenation.com.... couldn't beat the price.
didn't need to but could have done the sink like a smaller version that attaches to the ceiling (flush-mount).
it would have been cool.

Here are our lights...the island lights are from Quoizel (I think, or Murray Feiss) and the bfast chandy is from Overstock! (I was trying to save some $ at the end of our build!)

We just ordered our under cab lights. We went with LED pucks instead of the strips, mainly because of cost. The pucks were MUCH less. But, we don't have a lot of upper cabinets. 2 little ones (15"?) on either side of the hood, the corner and one that's maybe 24". If we had wider cabinets, we might have gone with the strips for more even light. But, from what we could tell, the pucks will work in our kitchen and save us some money.

Also, we chose LEDS for the energy-efficiency, convenience of not really having to worry about changing them, and for the type of light. I live with a brain injury and florescent lights trigger my headaches and xenon get pretty hot.

If you like contemporary to modern style, try ET2 lights. We're putting in the pendants from the Fizz line. They have so many fun lights.

Here is picture of my island lights:

kellienoelle

I haven't figured out how to post pictures yet but for pendants over our peninsula I had seen someone's jezebel pendants and fell in love with them - made by artists in NM
http://www.jezebelgallery.com/pro.php?id=205

Under cabinets we have seagull lighting.

Key is lots of lights with dimmers

good luck

I am hoping to have this one light installed above
sink. The rest of my kitchen has cans and is not
condusive to pendants, but I do love pendants.

A few ideas and dreams of my own to share.

wow, i started out looking at lights, but ended up drooling over the gorgeous kitchens boxer just posted!

i am up in the air on what to put over our island, so will continue to check back on this thread.....

I realize that I neglected to mention in my posting above what additional lighting is in our 5-pendant room. The ceiling lights don't show up in the photo.

We have two ceiling-hugging 3-light Besa lights in the middle of working kitchen for general lighting, four 2-light Besa ceiling hugging lights in the adjacent hallways, and undercab lights in working kitchen, plus hallogen light on the range hood. Plus the Quoizel "Denmark" pendants over the peninsula and long wall.

Here you see the central Besa lights installed, before we found the pendants. We are glad that we didn't do recessed lights. The room is a new space with attic above--we were the only house on the street that didn't have ice dams last year when there was a lot of snow on roofs in our neighborhood--success. We didn't want the lights to introduce ANY heat into the attic.

My only regret is that we didn't think harder about a ceiling fan. There are moments when one would be very useful, esp. when there is condensation on the windows.

I ended up with 8 5 inch recessed lights, Xenon under cabinet lighting and 3 Hampton Bay pendants from Home Depot which were $43 each. I really wanted wrought iron pendants, but most were too long for my low ceiling. Scale is also important in selecting lighting. I found other pendants I really liked, but they were too much for the kitchen. My Home Depot specials were just right.

Here is a link that might be useful: Kitchen lighting

Our pendants and central light are the Sonneman Transparence.

http://www.sonnemanawayoflight.com/transparence-1-light-pendant-p-4802.01.html

We also have LED strips for UCL. There are three strips over the sink to provide lots of task lighting.

We have 6 recessed lights currently. While many may say that we need more, I am thinking it is sufficient. We have an existing over the sink flush mount light (likely to be changed to a pendant). I am adding two pendants over the island (how will I ever decide), undercabinet lighting (thinking strip LEDs based on the pics posted here), and LED lights in the uppers along one wall of the kitchen. I think that will be enough to not make my kitchen with new cherry cabinets looks like a cave hopefully.

So going back to the pendants...I love all that have been posted from the cool chrome round ones to the lantern style. How will I ever decide!

Boxer - where did you find the second from the last of the pics you posted.

I do not remember where that image came from. Probably Houzz.
The pendant is Designed by Achille and Pier Giacomo
Castiglioni. A 1960s treasure.

Here is where you can buy it.

Here is a link that might be useful: Amazon

I have Cree recessed lights.
Kichler under cabinet LED bar lights with dimmers.
Kichler pendant light over sink (has matching dining room light)
You can see them in the pics on my kitchen gadget blog.

Here is a link that might be useful: Kitchen lighting

We have recessed lights all on dimmers and 3 pendants over the island also on dimmers. I love my pendant lights and just waiting on a replacement pin to install the 3rd light. We don't have many uppers but will be installing under cabinet lights as well.

Boxerpups--what is the first light you show (that is very pretty)?

And Muskokascp -- which is yours? Lovely as well.

Thanks Boxerpups, at $500 a pop, I don't think that I will be buying them! Very cool lights though, now off to find something comparable for those with a budget!

The lights are the Venezia by Sillux, model 8/238.

Thanks muskokascp, those are reallly nice. Where did you buy them, if I might further impose?

What are you doing on your island countertop? Your kitchen looks great (not to hijack the thread, apologiesin advance).

These are my Quoizel pendant lights. They are actually silver.

The smaller lights are halogen, from Home Depot, and the larger ones are from a lighting store on the Bowery, in NYC.