There's nothing like a chandelier or pendant light hanging over a dining room table to really bring the room to life. But there are a couple things to keep in mind when hanging it.
Measure your dining room table
We recommend sizing a chandelier 30 cm less in diameter than the table’s smallest width. Because the recommended height above a table in a room with an 8-foot ceiling is 76 cm, you might subtract a few cm from that so heads don’t bump as diners move to or from the table. Our Essence pendant lights are suspended in this restaurant
Match the scale of the fixture to ceiling height
Add 2 cm to the height of the chandelier for each foot the ceiling stands over 8 feet. A 12-foot ceiling would lift a chandelier to at least 85 cm above the table. If the ceiling is very high, you may use a larger chandelier to match the scale of the room rather than the size of the table; as the chandelier rises, “headroom” is no longer an issue.
Fit the chandelier to the proportions of the room
Add the two dimensions of the room in feet to get the diameter of the chandelier in cm. A 81 cm chandelier would look great on a 12-by-20-foot dining room but overwhelm a room that is only 10 feet wide by 15 feet long.
Consider perceptions
Although they may be the same overall size, a modern chandelier of informal starbursts using light-emitting diodes will appear to spread out wider than a formal, compact “crystal” chandelier. In addition, consider using an oblong chandelier for a long table or one customarily used with one or more leaves; a round or square piece might appear to be skimpy.