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Shedding New Light on Old Kitchens |
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Folks who rehabilitate an old-house kitchen often breeze past one of the most important concerns--the lighting. It's a common oversight because lighting technology is little understood by homeowners, and lighting's potential for enhancing kitchen ambiance is often missed by architects and designers. Then, too, homeowners mistakenly believe that they have to forego a kitchen that looks of a period with the rest of the house in order to use it in a contemporary way. The truth is that with good design, common sense, and some of the latest lighting technology, your kitchen can remain the center of life in your house while providing plenty of light for your work. Even though kitchens and electric light go back over 100 years (see sidebar), none of the historic approaches will provide adequate light for the way we live today. The question, then, is how to achieve an improved quality of light while maintaining or restoring the period ambiance of your kitchen. The answer is so basic that we often miss it: Put the light where you need it. When it comes to meeting the lighting requirements of kitchens, "there is no single light fixture that can perform all the functions," according to Randall Whitehead of Lighting Design Services in San Francisco. Instead, there needs to be layers of light. Lighting Types and Terms There are three major types of lighting that you can layer to illuminate a kitchen. The first, ambient light, is the general light in the room. Good ambient light allows you to work safely while giving the room its period look. The second, task light, provides higher and more-focused levels of light to a particular work area. The third, accent light, is even more focused and highlights objects or areas you want to show off, such as artwork, glassware, or special pottery. It also helps to understand some common terms people throw around when they discuss lighting. The luminaire is the light fixture, and a lamp is what most people know as a light bulb. Light has color, which is measured in degrees Kelvin and commonly summed up as being either cool or warm. The higher the temperature, the more white the light. Incandescent lamps normally produce light from 2,600K to 3,100K in temperature, a range that has a lot of yellow in it. Fluorescent lamps vary in color from 3,000K to 4,200K. Their higher numbers represent the "cool white" lamps sold in hardware stores that tend towards the blues. Fluorescent light has come a long way in the last five years, expanding tremendously in color range and installation flexibility. There are dimmable compact fluorescents, electronic ballasts that eliminate flickering, and tubes as tiny as a pencil. Now that you grasp the basics, let's address the unique lighting challenges that owners of old-house kitchens face. Very likely, your lighting is inadequate or unpleasant. There may be a single light source, or you may be working with a remuddled kitchen that has track lights, fluorescent lights, or recessed can lights in the ceiling. If any of these are the case, you are probably working in your own shadow most of the time. You may have wiring that is not up to code or insufficient to power the light levels you want. You may want to keep a wonderful original light fixture, but it is too small for modern needs or doesn't provide enough light. Your ceilings could be really low or really high. Or you may be working with solid masonry walls or pristine lath and plaster that you are loathe to cut into for wiring. Rest easy. There are solutions for all of these challenges. Ambient Options Another place to locate ambient light is at the top of cabinetry. Consider installing fluorescent tubes (now made as small as a T-2 size, about the diameter of a pencil), low-voltage light strips, or wall sconces on the soffit above the cabinets (an idea I picked up in Whitehead's book Lighten Up). Or, if your ceiling is very high, you can mount lighting along the inside of a crown moulding to create a glow around the perimeter of the ceiling. When the ceiling is high, hang your pendant light fixtures about 7' to 7' 6" above the floor. This lends a warm, more human scale to the room. If your ceiling is very low, flush-mounted ceiling fixtures are the only possibility for light in the center of the room. When this is the case, minimize the use of upper cabinets, and put sconces on the wall at about 6' high to make the room feel more balanced. Taking Light to Task With under-cabinet lighting, be sure to consider the nature of the surface material it will illuminate. If the surface is glossy, as in stainless steel and polished marble or granite, the counter will become a mirror reflecting the image of the light source. You'll avoid this problem if you aim the light on the backsplash--unless that is glossy too. Always bring the fixture forward and block the face so it doesn't shine in your eyes when you sit at a nearby table. Suppose you need light on a countertop where there are no upper cabinets. Two solutions come to mind. One is mounting wall sconces so they cast light down toward the counter. The other is discriminating use of recessed downlights. When you choose downlights, be sure they have housings with small apertures (openings). Also, make sure the color inside the housing and on the trim blends with the ceiling. For example, for a white ceiling you might pick a low-voltage downlight in a 4" aperture with white trim and inside. Mount downlights no more than 18" from the wall so they shine on the counter, not on your head. The MR16 lamp should be a flood type--that is, one that covers about a 40-degree spread. Your electrician can help you determine how many downlights you will need, but be careful not to overdo it. These fixtures are anachronisms in any historic period and best kept to a strict minimum. Where else do you need task light? How about in closets, pantries, cabinets, or drawers? Here take advantage of small light sources, such as appliance bulbs or fiber optic heads, mounted inside these spaces and controlled with a momentary contact or jamb switch. When you open the space, the light goes on; when you close it, the light goes off. The result is very efficient and effective. Artful Accents The ideas presented here vary greatly in up-front price tags, but long-term cost is relative to efficiency. For example, the typical 100-watt light bulb costs around 50 cents and lasts about 700 hours--roughly 29 days of constant use. The T-2 fluorescent tubes mentioned above cost about $2.80 yet last about 22,000 hours. That translates into 916 days, or nearly 3 years. Another item to consider for efficiency and energy savings is the compact fluorescent. Standard line-voltage light fixtures cost less than low-voltage (6- to 24-volt) systems. Fiber optics is more expensive. Fluorescent lighting provides the most light for the least money but has its limitations. Before making a decision about what will work best for your own project,
review all the possibilities with a lighting designer, a knowledgeable
interior designer or architect, or a reputable electrician. Since a
lot of these products and ideas are relatively new, be prepared for
a little research too. Most important, remember that you don't have
to overlight the kitchen to achieve good lighting. By lighting your
work, not the top of your head, you can get the light levels you need
while enhancing the charm of your period kitchen.
Carolyn Murray is the principal of Heritage Design Group based in San Francisco; (415-922-8404). Order Lighten Up by Randall Whitehead from Lightsource Publishers (415-626-1277).
SUPPLIERS LOW PROFILE FIXTURES Hafele Hera Lighting L.P. W.A.C. Lighting PERIOD FIXTURES American Home Supply Arroyo Craftsman Brass Light Gallery Concord Lighting Historic Lighting Rejuvenation Lamp & Fixture Co. Roy Electric Co. Inc. Old California Lantern Co. |
