Two options:

Pick the best color and get started. Be prepared to repaint if the color sucks.

Wait until the lighting is installed before selecting the color. The good news is this decision can wait until the day before the painters show up.

Here is a compromise. If you are selecting whites for instance, you can start to paint with the color you think is the best candidate. Wait for the final coat on the ones you can do ahead of time. Only complete the project when you are certain of the final color. If you change your mind, you can do the final topcoat and not have to redo things.

You might want to post the color candidates. Someone here will know if they cast yellow or grey or blue or green.

I used multiple lamps to view sample boards under various lightbulbs, since incandescent is on the outs and I hate cfl and what it does to color. Then tried one smaller wall before committing. I am very happy with how the paint color looks overall.

Good tips from you both, thanks! I suppose I could buy some LED bulbs and put them in a few lights to get an idea of what it does to the color. So far, we're still using incandescents because we had bought a huge box on sale at Costco.

My paint is going to be a very pale yellowy-cream painted over walnut cabinets. So I'll probably need 2-3 coats of primer. So, yeah, good idea to get those done and wait for final coat/final decision later. BTW, HomeChef, I am the painter and I paint slow in order to do a good job. Heck, I'm slow, period, lol.

A combo of both your suggestions makes sense. I guess I can quit procrastinating and get started!

I will try to get good pictures to share for feedback on the color itself. I downloaded the online color "swatch" from SW and it looks nothing like the white foamboard I painted with my sample. So I'll have to take photos and see if I've captured the color accurately first.

Note that the light will vary by manufacturer even though the bulb type and numbers might be the same. You kinda have to see whose bulbs you like too, unfortunately.

Really, snookums2? Really? I have to figure that out, too? Good grief! I just got use to having to weed through all the choices for phones and such and no longer yearn for the simplicity of Ma Bell. Now I have to adjust to this, too?

I do sound like an old crone, don't I? :)

I had no idea. I don't even know where to start with this. I really don't want to have to spend a few hundred bucks on bulbs to figure it out either.

Any suggestions?

I seem to like Cree LED (soft or is it called warm) from Home Depot. I just tried a (soft) Phillips LED and liked the color. Those are with a lampshade though. Still looking for something warm for the kitchen. I don't like the light too cool or white or above 2700.

Thanks for those suggestions. I have been reading about the warm to cool spectrum and am intuitively leaning toward the warm end. However, I've read that the spectrum called daylight is best for task lighting and that, in a place like a kitchen, one should have a mix of warm and daylight. Or cool and daylight if they prefer that look.

Thanks for pointing me to a couple of specific brands to try out.

Pale yellow is a highly mutable color. Both my kitchen and bedroom are yellow so I've grappled with this.

The concern about light bulb color is justified. I wouldn't worry about it. Just go with a color that looks great in daylight. The bulbs can be adjusted and good LEDs have very clean light. You won't get the green spectrum distortion you would get with compact fluorescents.

The link explains some bulb color basics.

Here is a link that might be useful: Making Sense of Lightbulb Color

Having repainted over 100lf of cabinetry THREE TIMES, I say wait.

Get a good primer coat up and hang tight. Unless you're stupid impatient as I was. Really, I was just stupid.

My lighting didn't change, but the paint did, depending upon the sun exposure. I realize that's unusual, but it seems my sliders have some kind of sun protection/coating on them that is ... blue. All my lovely, perfect-this-time sagey-greens turned turquoise.

I finally figured out what was happening and wanted to shoot myself started using big square samples in all different lights. The sagey-green I sought turned out to be Glidden's 'Natural Linen." Evidently has a yellow undertone with a lot of gray, which turned ... perfect.

I'm now smart enough not to paint my front bathroom any Dijon-ish colors yet, because the lights' glass shades aren't installed. I know now the light bulb hanging in a little cagey thing is shedding a different light than my fixture actually will.

Don't beat yourself to death. Get your lighting in THEN perhaps only once spend the time and money on painting.

JMHO.

@rococogurl - I hate to research what it means to have a mutable color. That's good info to know for the kitchen and future projects. Thanks for the tips.

@CEFreeman - Thanks for confirming that I can get started with base but to avoid the final colors until lighting is figured out. We have to tear out a bunch of stuff in our basement in order to be able to run the new wiring to the kitchen for the lighting and additional plug-ins before we put in the final lights. So it will take awhile for all this to happen.

In the meantime, I'll buy some different bulbs to try in our current lighting fixtures that will be replaced as well as the temporary extra lighting (clamp-on shop lights) to at least get an idea if my color choice works with lighting.

I'm anxious but there's so much to do with sanding, several thin coats of primer (painting over walnut stained cabinets) and such that I can make progress until lighting is finalized before finishing.

Oh, it's all a juggling act, isn't it?

Everybody's comments are quite helpful. I appreciate confirming my suspicions about waiting to do the final coats. I don't want to have to repaint several times to get it right!

@rococogurl - Had to research, not hate to research. Arrrggghh, I should proofread more. :)