1. When we drew up the plans for this house, there was not supposed to be a light above the kitchen island. We had asked our contractor to simply leave an open box above the island, so that we could add a fixture later. (We'd kind of settled on a modern halogen track system that we'd found at Buchheit's.) The only thing not right on the house when it was delivered was that they had added two lights above the island. (Considering that this is all we didn't like about the house, we didn't complain. This was small potatoes.)
2. The problem with the installed lights is that they were centered in the kitchen, not centered above the island. So just adding new light fixtures wasn't an option, because it would be even more noticeable that they weren't centered over the island. So we started brainstorming.
3. Three years later, we had put that project on the back burner while we tackled everything else you've read about here. But this fall we were discussing it again, and trying to come up with a plan. Jas was against pendants, because he thought they'd interrupt the flow and make it difficult to see from the living room to the kitchen (and vice versa). I really wanted pendants, but didn't want run-of-the-mill pendants. Also, the thought of climbing into the attic and moving the junction boxes, plus drywalling and painting over the existing holes after we added new ones did not seem appealing. So we looked at all our options.
4. We finally settled on pendants, with two conditions. One, they had to be different (I definitely wanted to DIY them for a custom look.). Second, they couldn't be too low (disrupting the view from one room to another).
5. Menard's had three pendant light kits on clearance over the winter, so we snagged those and began the long and arduous process of finding the perfect pendants. And when I say long and arduous, I'm not kidding. We spent over six months looking for exactly what we wanted. We were going to do Mason Jar lights, but it seems everybody's doing those (plus, the light they cast wouldn't really focus downward, which we wanted for the island -- we definitely wanted more "task" lighting). It seemed like every store we went to, we searched for odd items we could re-purpose as pendants (so they'd be one-of-a-kind).
6. Eventually, we discovered dark brown and green flower pots at Dollar General. $6 apiece. Hallelujah, the search was over! They were exactly the right size and shape, so we snapped them up and took them home.
7. Next, Jas drilled holes in the bottom of the flower pots so the pendant light kit could go through. Then we had to paint them, which took several coats and lots and lots of sanding. We went with brushed nickel, so they'd match the rest of our fixtures.
8. The last step was building the box. Remember earlier how I mentioned that the lights were off-center and Jas didn't want to climb into the attic to redo the junction boxes, plus re-drywall the ceiling to cover the old holes? Yeah, he hadn't changed his mind on that. :) And I don't blame him. So we compromised with a shallow box that the pendants attach to, that is attached to the ceiling. The box had to be large enough to cover the old holes, and once we painted it white it fit right in. (The kids even got to help install it!)
I'm super happy with the way they turned out. And the light is just perfect! Jas painted the insides of the pendants white, so more light is reflected. And they're short enough that they don't block your view from one room to the other, yet they're substantial enough to fit with that massive island. Love, love, love them!
