I'm not sure it is such a large recess that you would get a way with making a feature of it as mentioned above. A dropped ceiling with LED would be more appropriate, but that is likely to cost more than simply having the fluorescent taken out an the hole boarded and plastered. There are large LED panel fittings for sale on Bay, but the max. size of these seems to be 30 x 120, which is too small to fill or cover your gap. If you are looking for an inexpensive solution, then you (or a handy local electrician) could try making your own light fitting on a dropped panel to cover it over - something that fits the scale and proportion of the room better than that recess does! (it's not clear how the recess is positioned in relation to the other structures in the room, but here's a couple of ideas...) It's probable, though, that you are relying on this one source of light too much. Even if you have a very bright light on your kitchen ceiling there will still be shadows cast that will stop you from being able to see when you're using your work surfaces, unless you have strategically placed LED downlighter recessed in the ceiling. Perhaps you could think about fitting some LED strips under your wall cabinets to provide some bright task lighting over your worktops. IKEA has a great solution for this and if you do it you'll find you don't need to worry about the quality of light from above quite so much, which then broadens the range of single pendant fittings you could look at using. The strips also provide great mood lighting when the kitchen is not being used :)

It's quite a small space so I would suggest that the pendants are no larger than 200mm diameter. Ensure downlights are centered over worktops and a good rule of thumb for a kitchen with standard ceiling heights is 1.5m's apart. Linear LED tape for under cupboard lighting - around 12watts/m will provide ample light and this could be complimented with the same lighting on top of the units. If within budget, pendants on switch A, Downlights B and Linear LED switch C - all on dimmers. Kitchens

Hi, you could knock through kitchen and living room - you’d have a lovely kitchen/dining/living space. Then have the existing dining room as evening lounge or snug. Depends on your family situation I think as to whether you want the stairs off this room. You have a lot of doors - blocking one or two of them off would obviously give you more wall space to play with for furniture. Alternatively, knock through kitchen and dining room together; and have a glass wall where I’ve shown, so that your stairs are off a new hallway. I saw something on Houzz but I can’t find it now, where they’d done something similar to let light in; think there was a nook for a desk or storage in the hall too. Good luck x

I’m with Sonia. For me the tiles date the kitchen and the worktops are probably showing their age. If you can afford to replace them it will transform the kitchen and might well cost the same as professionally refinishing the doors. And I also agree that painting cabinets is best left to professionals but you could change the wall colour to make the room feel different. If it were my room I would try to find a Quartz worktop (try to find a warm colour as very white could make the cabinets look old) and I might well have a worktop splashback instead of tiles. And then you have a neutral kitchen and can apply almost any wall colour. Choosing this is easy- you either choose a colour consistent with other colour choices in the house or you pick a colour from the rug. I like Daisy suggestion of a soft green wall colour (but only if the blue tiles have been replaced.)