Hi Wendy, I've had a similar dilemma from a client in Sydney and we plastered the ceiling up (similar to Dohraime's images) and it was a real transformation. You could box in around your skylights too so you don't lose that lovely light. If this is all to expensive then paint the pebbles (spraying might be the best to get coverage) and the beams the same colour so that neither attract any attention but rather they act as a neutral backdrop for the room. Good luck, this is a bit of a challenge. Cheers, Michelle

Is that 10metres x 6 metres? What a nice big space to work with. In that case, my idea for spacing them evenly isn't going to look right. Definitely draw an imaginary line where you consider your kitchen & kitchen island space will be, THEN consider the remaining area is where the fans and feature pendant are to go. If it were me, I would have fans with longer than usual blades and a pendant that is rather large and which all complement one another (style-wise). If you draw out your room on graph paper, sketch in where the furniture will be placed, where the fireplace is, and then think about the best locations for the fans and lighting. I would imagine the pendant needs to be in the vicinity of the seating arrangement? Or possibly in the centre of the living area space? Will the pendant be the main source of light in the room or will you also have lamps? I hope this helps.

@Garry it's a good question to discuss with the professional doing the Passive House (Passivhaus) modelling on your project. Without knowing the details of your project it's hard to be definitive. The HRVS will provide all the fresh air you need and it will be silent and provide fresh air at a very low velocity so you won't feel any draughts from it. (so no breezy feeling a ceiling fan gives you.) The "heat recovery" aspect is simply a heat exchanger and with the right system, it will help keep it cool indoors when it's hotter outdoors. In this situation, the heat transfers from the hotter incoming air to the cooling outgoing air so it doesn't come into the house. (As opposed to when it's cooler outside and the heat transfers from the outgoing air to the incoming air to stay inside the house.) The HRVS system may also provide humidity control and usually can have a cooling system added to temper the ventilation air if needed. (Cooling is allowable in a certified Passive House - it just has an energy limit the same as heating.) A ceiling fan simply moves air around in the room, it doesn't provide any cooling. The breezy feel of air movement can provide additional comfort in warm temperatures, though. However, somewhat counter-intuitively, a ceiling fan actually heats the space at the same time - simply because it is using energy to run the motor and turn the fan and this gives off heat. Particularly in a Passive House, the heat from the fan energy stays in the space. Cooling can also be provided in a Passive House in various other ways. For example, using a mini-split air conditioning unit. This just cools and recirculates air in the space where the indoor unit is located. Usually, these are relatively high velocity and you will hear and feel the air movement - which can be pleasant if it's not too cold or too fast. So, in all likelihood, you probably won't need ceiling fans, but if you really wanted them it's probably possible. :-) Hope that's useful.

Velux Skylights which are 580mm wide are designed to fit between rafters or trusses that are spaced at 600mm centres, with the long side (780mm in your case) running with the fall of the roof, and not across the slope. You should look at your roof plan to work out where the slope, ridge and hips are, as your skylights need to work with the slope and can't cut across ridges or hips. The position will depend on the direction of the fall of your roof, and the spacing of the roof rafters or trusses. In some cases you can build a raked shaft to get them close to where you want, but you don't have enough information in this plan to provide an answer. I have a similar Velux skylight over my kitchen island and I would recommend you get one that can open as well as a block-out blind. Best of luck Dr Retro of Dr Retro House Calls