There are many factors at work here with respect to the height. Obviously, the higher the lamp the more area it will cover, but at less intensity. Our pendants over the island are quite high, but we use indoor flood lights in the pendands so the light is confined to the countertop. We have a stockpile of incandescent spotlight bulbs to use up, but I will eventually replace with CFL enclosed as floods or LED floods which look the same.

We wanted to use "cheapie" spiral CFLs in our bathroom fixture, so we shopped for a fixture which had enclosed globes.

fori, if you have not already, you might go ask about bulbs at a local lighting store? I think our GU24-base bulbs look just fine (but I admit I have not spent much time thinking about it). We got them from the lighting store, not available at our local HD last time I checked (last summer). I don't know what brand but can try to check tonight if you like.

There are now LED bulbs that are made of clear glass and look nice. Just do a search for "LED bulbs clear" and they will pop up.

numbersjunkie, unfortunately to satisfy Title 24 requirements, it needs to be a GU-24 base or approved integrated LED luminaire -- though I suppose you might find an inspector who would let you slide with an E26 base LED bulb.

fori, does the most recent Title 24 still allow 50% of max wattage to be non-high efficacy?

I would say you should indeed "forget about this stupid restriction" and just get the fixtures you like. Either you will find (eventually) a GU-24 base bulb that you find acceptable in look, or they will someday get rid of the stupid restriction. I even have heard tell of folks who have fixtures re-lamped to E26 after inspection. Then you can use the nice clear LED bulbs that numbersjunkie mentioned!

Good luck.

Out of left field, Fori, I can only offer that I have been known to dip the bottom third of LED bulbs in amber shellac to make the light appear "real" again. Don't know if it's the filament or the hideous klunky plastic housing you're objecting to (and I'm in far-off Maine with no restrictions at all so not sure I've even seen the most egregiously bad bulbs) -- but the shellac does hide the circuitry and works a treat on that ugly blue cast.

The LEDs don't get nearly hot enough to ever remelt the shellac; mine have been in use for 4 or 5 years so far with no issues.

Oh yikes. Just googled "GU-24 LED" and see what you're up against. My sympathies!

I see there's a raging market for these, so you can't be the only frustrated one:

{{gwi:2137170}}

Surely using an LED, albeit with an E-26 base rather than GU-24 base, fulfils the spirit if not letter of the law..?

Thanks all. I think I might just count on light positioning to hide the bulbs. And I'll look for the better-looking ones. I know they are getting better all the time. I should just count on industry to fix it.

It's not the plastic part that bothers me because it's usually way up there hidden. The bulb part usually looks wrong. The shellac trick sounds interesting...I can see how that might warm things up some.

We have almost entirely swapped out bulbs and fixtures in the house for lower electricity usage so I'm used to the light quality. I used GU-24 fluorescents from Rejuvenation in my last kitchen (and bought their default bulbs) and the light was really good; much better than the HD specials the POs put in my current house. (I really do like that Rejuvenation will stick a fluorescent socket into anything it'll fit in.)

Our LED bulbs are Maxlite MaxLEDs and Satco.

We actually have GU24 spiral CFL in our wall sconces (downlights with opaque shades), which I never even noticed until I just went to look.

Good luck!

How about some cool looking Edison bulbs?