Quick answer
Layer kitchen lighting in three tiers: bright task lighting (downlights or under-cabinet LED) over benches and the sink, softer ambient light for overall fill, and warm under-cabinet strips to kill shadows. In Auckland, get the wiring and dimmers planned before the GIB goes on — MTN Kitchens scopes this during supply-and-install. Run one colour temperature — 3000K to 4000K — and dimmers throughout.
Most kitchen lighting problems are decided before anyone picks a fitting. They are decided the day the sparky and the kitchen company do or do not talk to each other. We have walked into plenty of new kitchens around Auckland where the cabinetry is sharp, the benchtop is bang on, and the lighting is a single downlight floating in the wrong spot, throwing the cook's own shadow straight onto the chopping board. That is not a fittings problem. That is a planning problem, and it gets locked in the moment the GIB goes on.
Light Works In Layers, Not One Downlight
We build and install 10-plus kitchens a week out of our East Tamaki workshop, and the jobs that light well are the ones where the layers got sorted at plan stage: task light where you actually work, ambient to lift the whole room, under-cabinet LED to kill the bench shadows. Get those three talking and a melteca kitchen holds its own. Get them wrong and a 2-pac job with stone tops still feels flat. This is what we tell builders and homeowners before the first cable gets pulled.
Key points
- Layer three things — task, ambient and under-cabinet. One layer on its own never works.
- Under-cabinet LED is the biggest upgrade for the money, and it has to be wired before the GIB and planned with the cabinetry.
- Put downlights in front of the bench edge, not over the wall units, or you light your own shoulders and shadow the bench.
- Pick one colour temperature for the room — 3000K to 4000K — and run it everywhere. Mixed kelvin reads as a fault.
- Decide switching and dimming circuits before line-out. Adding them after the GIB is up means cutting walls.
Why one layer is never enough
A kitchen is the only room in the house that is part workshop, part living space, part showroom. You prep raw chicken in it and you pour wine in it, sometimes within the same hour. No single light source does both jobs. That is the whole reason lighting designers bang on about layering — it is not a luxury idea, it is just what the room demands.
Task lighting is the bright, focused stuff over the bench, the hob and the sink, where you need to see what your hands are doing. Ambient is the soft, even fill that stops the room reading as a cave with bright patches. Under-cabinet is the third — LED strip under the wall units that puts light on the bench without your own body getting in the way. Accent is the optional extra on top — a pendant, a strip inside a glass cabinet, a wash up a feature wall — and it wants restraint. Pile on accent without sorting task and you get a pretty room you cannot cook in.
The classic failure is a grid of downlights and nothing else. Builder-spec, evenly spaced, looks tidy on the reflected ceiling plan. Then someone stands at the bench, the downlight is behind them, and their own body blocks the light. Now they are chopping in their own shadow. That is the exact problem under-cabinet light solves, and it is why we treat under-cabinet as core, not as an add-on.
Task lighting: light where the work happens
Task light has one rule — it has to come from in front of you or above the work surface, never from behind your back. For the main bench runs, that means downlights positioned over the front edge of the benchtop, roughly 250 to 350mm off the wall, not centred over the cabinet or worse, over the wall units. Centre them over the wall cupboards and every bit of light lands on the cupboard doors and your back, none on the bench.
Over the hob, the rangehood usually carries its own light, but check the lux — a lot of budget hoods have one weak lamp that is more mood than function. If the cook is serious, plan a downlight just forward of the hood as well. For more on getting extraction and the hood itself right, see Rangehood and Ventilation: Ducted vs Recirculating. Over the sink, one well-placed downlight forward of the bowl beats the standard 'nothing there at all', which is what we find on a surprising number of plans.
The island is a task surface too
If the island has a prep zone or a hob, it needs proper task light, not just pendants chosen for looks. Pendants give pools of light and a focal point, but a single decorative pendant rarely throws enough usable light onto a 2.4 metre island. We often pair pendants with two recessed downlights set forward of the seating edge so the bench is genuinely lit, and the pendants do the styling. If you are still sizing the island itself, sort that first — lighting follows the bench, not the other way round. Our Kitchen Island Design and Sizing Guide covers the dimensions that make the rest of this easy.
Under-cabinet LED: what to run and where to mount it
If we could only add one thing to a builder-spec kitchen, it would be under-cabinet LED. It sits under the wall units and lights the benchtop directly, from in front of the cook, so it kills the shadow problem completely. It also throws a clean line of light across the splashback that makes the whole kitchen look considered. On a melteca kitchen it is the single detail that lifts it. On a stone-and-2-pac kitchen it is what makes the bench glow.
The two main options are LED strip in an aluminium channel, or individual puck lights. Strip in a channel is what we run most of the time — it gives a continuous, even wash with no hot spots, and the channel with a diffuser hides the diodes so you do not see dotty reflections in a gloss splashback or a polished stone bench. Pucks are cheaper and quicker but they spotlight, and in a reflective splashback you see every dot. For a quality finish, strip wins.
Mounting matters. The strip wants to sit at the front edge of the underside of the wall unit, behind a small recessed rail or shadow line, so the diode is hidden and the light washes down and back toward the splashback. Tuck it at the back and you light the wall, not the bench. This is a cabinetry detail as much as an electrical one, which is exactly why the kitchen company and the sparky have to be on the same page before the units are built. We build the channel detail into the wall units in the workshop so the strip drops in clean on site.
Ambient: the layer people forget to plan
Ambient light is the fill that makes the room comfortable rather than clinical. In an open-plan kitchen-living space it matters even more, because the kitchen lighting has to play nicely with the lounge, not blast it. A wall of bright 5000K downlights bleeding into a relaxed living zone feels like an operating theatre at one end and a lounge at the other. For how the whole zone hangs together, Open-Plan Kitchen-Living Design is worth a read alongside this.
Ambient can come from several places — perimeter downlights on their own dimmable circuit, a soft wash off the ceiling, LED above the wall units throwing light up onto the ceiling, or even good pendants run low. The trick is to put it on its own switch and dimmer so you can drop the room back at night while keeping a bit of task light on for a glass of water. One switch for everything is the enemy of a kitchen that feels right at 7am and 10pm.
Above-cabinet LED is an underrated ambient move. A strip on top of the wall units, hidden behind the cabinet's top edge, washes the ceiling and gives the room a warm float of light with zero glare. It costs very little, it is dead easy if the cabinetry is planned for it, and it makes a small kitchen feel taller. We detail it the same way as under-cabinet — the channel goes in at the workshop.
Colour temperature: pick one number and commit
Colour temperature is measured in kelvin (K). Lower is warmer and yellower, higher is cooler and bluer. For NZ kitchens the sensible range is 3000K to 4000K. 2700K is lovely and warm but can make whites and food look a touch dull on the bench. 3000K is the safe, warm-but-clean default we use most. 4000K is crisper, reads as 'clean and modern', and suits a lot of cool-toned and white kitchens. Above 4000K you are into clinical territory — fine for a garage, wrong for a home kitchen.
The one rule that matters more than the exact number: keep it consistent. Mixing 3000K downlights with 4000K under-cabinet strip and a 2700K pendant looks like a fault, not a design choice. The eye reads the mismatch instantly. Spec one temperature and hold it across every fitting in the room. If you genuinely want warm dimming — lights that go warmer as you dim them, like a real bulb — that is a specific fitting type, spec it deliberately across the whole room, do not let it happen by accident.
The other number worth a glance is CRI — colour rendering index. Higher CRI means colours look truer. For a kitchen, where you are judging whether the chicken is cooked and whether the tomato is ripe, aim for CRI 90-plus. Cheap fittings sit around 80 and food looks slightly off under them. It is a small spec line that makes a real difference.
| Layer | Typical fitting | Colour temp | On its own circuit? |
|---|---|---|---|
| Task — bench | Downlights forward of bench edge | 3000K-4000K | Yes |
| Under-cabinet | LED strip in channel, CRI 90+ | Match the room | Yes, dimmable |
| Ambient | Perimeter downlights / above-cabinet LED | Match the room | Yes, dimmable |
| Accent / island | Pendants + recessed downlights | Match the room | Pendants separate |
Switching and dimming: design the circuits, not just the fittings
This is where good kitchens are quietly made. The fittings can be perfect, but if everything is on one switch you have lost. We plan kitchen lighting as separate circuits so each layer can be controlled on its own: task downlights, under-cabinet, ambient/perimeter, and pendants. That usually means three or four switched circuits, and the ones worth dimming — ambient and under-cabinet especially — go on dimmers.
Put the switches where people actually enter and stand. A two-way or even three-way arrangement so you can kill the lights from the living-room doorway and the hallway saves the nightly walk-of-shame back to one switch plate. In an open-plan space this is not a nicety, it is basic livability. Talk it through with the sparky and mark it on the plan.
Two dimming traps to avoid. First, not every LED dims cleanly — the fitting, the driver and the dimmer all have to be compatible, or you get flicker and buzz at low levels. Spec dimmable fittings and a matched dimmer, do not assume. Second, LED strip dims at the driver, so the dimmer type has to suit the strip and driver combo. Get this sorted at spec, because finding out at handover means swapping parts and an unhappy client.
What to wire before the GIB goes on
Here is the part that catches people. Almost everything above has to be roughed in before the plasterboard is fixed and stopped. Once the GIB is on, painted and the cabinetry is in, adding a cable means cutting walls, patching, re-stopping and repainting — a small fortune in chasing for what should have been a five-minute decision at line-out. The cheapest time to add a light is when the walls are open framing. The dearest is after the painter has been through.
The Wiring You Cannot Add Later
- Downlight positions marked and roughed in — forward of the bench edge, over the hob, over the sink, and over the island, set out off the cabinetry layout, not guessed.
- Under-cabinet LED supply: a cable left at each wall-unit run, in the right spot, with the driver location agreed.
- Above-cabinet LED supply if you are doing ambient up-wash.
- Pendant points over the island, on the correct centres for the final island size, at the right height for the ceiling.
- Separate switch drops and dimmer locations for each lighting circuit, at the doorways people actually use.
- Power for the rangehood light and any appliance lighting.
None of that works if the kitchen layout is a guess. The reason we push for the cabinetry to be designed and measured before the electrical rough-in is exactly this — the lights are set out off the cabinets. If the island moves 200mm after the pendants are roughed in, the pendants are now off-centre forever, or you are back into the ceiling. Getting the measure right first is the whole game; our take on that is in Site Measure vs Plan Measure: Getting Kitchen Dimensions Right. Coordinating it with the sparky and the rest of the trades is covered in Coordinating Kitchen Install With Your Other Trades.
Half the lighting jobs I fix were never broken — the cable just went in before anyone knew where the bench was. Set out the lights off the kitchen drawings and you fix nothing on site.
Pendants over the island: heights and spacing that work
Pendants are the one lighting choice everyone has an opinion on, and the one most often hung wrong. The rule of thumb we use: the bottom of the pendant sits roughly 700 to 800mm above the benchtop. That is high enough to see across the island and not crack your head, low enough to feel intentional and throw light where you want it. On a standard 2.4 metre stud with a benchtop at 900mm, that lands the pendant base around 1.6 to 1.7 metres off the floor.
Spacing depends on island length and pendant size. Two pendants suit an island up to about 2.4 metres; three for 2.4 to 3-plus metres. Set them out evenly along the island and centred over the bench width — or deliberately offset if there is a hob or sink to clear — and keep the gap between pendants and from the ends balanced by eye. A single large statement pendant can work over a smaller island, but back it up with recessed downlights for actual task light. If you have a higher stud or a raked ceiling, all the numbers shift, so we set those out per ceiling rather than off a chart.
A worked Auckland scenario
Take a typical job we see — a renovated villa in Mt Albert, walls open back to the framing, new open-plan kitchen-living knocked through. Galley-plus-island layout: a 3.6 metre bench run along one wall under wall units, a 2.7 metre island with a breakfast overhang, sink in the island, hob on the wall run under the rangehood.
Here is how the lighting layers out. Task: four downlights along the wall run, set 300mm off the wall so they land on the front of the bench, plus one forward of the hood. Under-cabinet: LED strip in channel along the full 3.6 metre wall-unit run, CRI 90, 3000K, driver tucked in the end pantry. Island: three pendants on even centres at 750mm above the bench, backed by two recessed downlights set forward of the seating edge so the prep zone is genuinely lit. Ambient: six perimeter downlights through the living end plus an above-cabinet up-wash on the wall run, the lot on a dimmer.
Circuits: task on one switch, under-cabinet on a dimmer, ambient/perimeter on a dimmer, pendants on their own switch — all two-way between the hallway door and the living-room end. Every cable roughed in while the framing is open, all set out off the kitchen drawings so nothing moves when the cabinetry lands. The kitchen itself is a melteca-and-laminate spec to keep the budget honest. The lighting is where we spent the thinking, not the money. If budget is the driver, Renovating a Kitchen Without Blowing the Budget lines up well with this approach.
Lighting for rentals and volume builds
Not every kitchen needs the full treatment. On build-to-rent and volume townhouse work, we strip it back to what earns its keep: a clean grid of downlights set out properly off the bench, and under-cabinet LED on the main run. That alone makes a low-cost kitchen photograph and live far better than the bare-downlight default, for not much more spend, and it is robust — no fragile pendants for tenants to knock. For the wider spec logic on rentals, see Build-to-Rent Kitchen Specs That Protect Your Yield.
For developers running spec across many units, the win is standardising the lighting layout the same way you standardise the cabinetry — one set-out, one circuit plan, repeated. It kills variations and RFIs because the sparky knows exactly where everything goes on every unit. Consistency is the whole game at volume, and it applies to light as much as to door finishes. How to Keep Kitchen Spec Consistent Across 30+ Units walks through the same logic for the rest of the kitchen.
Common mistakes we still fix
- Downlights centred over the wall units, lighting the cupboard doors and the cook's back instead of the bench.
- Under-cabinet pucks in a gloss splashback — every dot reflected back, looks cheap.
- Mixed colour temperatures across one room, reading as a fault.
- Everything on one switch, no dimming, no flexibility between morning prep and evening wind-down.
- Pendants hung too high or off-centre because the island size changed after rough-in.
- Driver for the LED strip buried where it cannot be reached when it eventually fails.
- Lighting designed off a generic ceiling plan instead of set out from the actual kitchen drawings.
Frequently asked questions
What colour temperature is best for a kitchen?
3000K to 4000K for an NZ home kitchen. 3000K is a safe warm-but-clean default; 4000K reads crisper and suits white or cool-toned kitchens. The bigger rule is to keep one temperature consistent across every fitting — mixed kelvin looks like a fault.
Is under-cabinet lighting worth it?
It is the best-value upgrade in a kitchen. It lights the bench from in front of the cook, killing the shadow you get from ceiling downlights, and it gives the whole kitchen a considered look. Use LED strip in a channel rather than pucks for an even, dot-free wash.
How high should pendants hang over an island?
Roughly 700 to 800mm from the top of the benchtop to the bottom of the pendant. On a standard ceiling that puts the pendant base around 1.6 to 1.7 metres off the floor. Higher studs and raked ceilings shift the numbers, so set them out per ceiling.
What lighting do I need to wire before the GIB goes on?
All of it — downlight positions, under-cabinet and above-cabinet LED supply, pendant points, and separate switch and dimmer drops. Once the plasterboard is up and painted, adding a cable means cutting and patching walls, which is expensive. Rough it in while the framing is open.
Can I add lighting after the kitchen is installed?
Some things, awkwardly and at cost — usually it means chasing walls, patching GIB and repainting, or surface-mounted fittings that look like an afterthought. Far cheaper to plan the layers and circuits at design stage and rough in before line-out.
Why do my LEDs flicker when I dim them?
The fitting, driver and dimmer are not compatible. LED dimming only works cleanly when all three are matched and the fittings are spec'd as dimmable. Sort this at spec stage rather than discovering it at handover.
We build and install across Auckland out of our own East Tamaki workshop — one contract, one invoice for supply and install, trade pricing with no showroom markup. If you are at design or framing stage and want the kitchen drawn so the lighting sets out cleanly, send us your plans or your unit count and we'll turn a quote around in 24 hours. Get the layers and the circuits sorted before the GIB goes on and you will not be cutting walls open later.