We've chosen those Pottery Barn pendants for above our island and I was going to ask the experts here their opinion.

The whimsical option is fun.. but it's going to be hard to mix and match with. What do you currently have over the island? Are you definitely replacing them? I'm quite partial to the PB ones, but that's just my taste. I wouldn't recommend trying to mix pendants over the island, and if the sink is in a straight line from the end of the island it might be difficult to pull off a wildly different pendant. If you could find a family of lights that had two options, a more reserved and more complex one (someone did this not that long ago) and use the simpler ones over the island and a complementary funky one for the sink, that might work better.

The ones we have now (previous owner) are very simple, frosted glass shade on a silver fluted rod...they're okay but don't really go with the rest of my new "look" (which is more of an 1873 farmhouse/eclectic-mix-of-colors-and-finishes kind of style). ;-)

Before this house, I'd never even had pendants before, didn't know what they were until I read about them here! Now I'm obsessed with finding the right ones.

I suppose if I buy the funkier one and it doesn't work in the kitchen, I can find somewhere else for it.

Are you keeping 3 pendants over the island? On that length island, I think 2 pendants would be fine. Our island is 81" x 39"; we have 2 pendants and they light the space.

re: mixing in the fun pendant, if the finishes are the same (e.g., both ORB), I think it could be a fun focal point over your sink but I'd stick with 2 pendants over the island. It's so different it will be clear that you're not trying to match (but you will want to harmonize.) And if the cabinet hardware is the same finish, then things will coordinate. It looks like both lights are ORB, and the PB ones are such clean simple lines that they won't distract from the fun one. Disclaimer: I'm not a designer. But I do believe in using things that make you happy.

FYI someone else posted about the PB lights in another thread, because with the clear glass she felt the bulbs were too bright when on.

You could try printing large pictures of each kind of light, hang them from strings in their intended spaces (tape to balloons or something) and see what you think of how they look near each other.

I was planning to keep the 3 pendants mostly because it's what is there now, and would be easy to just switch out. (though you are right, I don't really need 3--PO had a VERY long skinny farm table, probably a foot longer than what we have at least)

Plus, our ceiling is two levels (part of the kitchen used to be a porch, and that ceiling is about 9" lower than the rest). One pendant hangs from this lowered section, and the other 2 hang from the higher section, but all at the same height from the island.

If I had two lights, I suppose I would move the 2 outer lights in toward the center a bit; then, however, one of the lights would be pretty close to where the ceiling changes height--might draw more attention to it and be more obvious?

Or could I just keep the 2 outside lights where they are now, and ditch the middle light?

Would love more opinions! :-)