If it has no varnish, light sand then oil. If varnished very good sand using a electric sander, medium first sand then finer the second sand, wipe down to get all dust off then oil. If you use a combo of linseed and turpentine make sure you use gum turpentine. Use more turpentine to start off as will penetrate the wood better. Good luck

Warm white, cool white, daylight have nothing to do with how bright a light and don't let anyone try and convince you otherwise. These names are given to the colour the globe emits. In the shots you have supplied you can see how blue the light is, this means it is a high kelvin rating. It looks to me to be 6000 k or up. 3000 k is perfect for nearly anything in a house, kitchen, living or bathroom. The important thing when talking about brightness is the lumen level, or output. In the kitchen look for around 900 and in a living area where you want more subtle lighting look for something closer to 400 lumen. Dimmers then change the output but not the colour, this is how you change a mood in a room.

LED lighting has made such a difference to how you can illuminate your home now and they give excellent light so you don't need the number of downlights as before. Strip lighting on stairs, for example, can look amazing and add wow to your home. Be guided by the experts above, or a good electrician should be able to give you practical advice. In some rooms one downlight can even be enough if you plan on having other feature lighting. Pendant lights for your bedroom will look great, but look at what wattage the lights you choose will take and whether you will need any other lights in the room. I have always been very minimalist in my home and try to keep to one light in each room for general access lighting and have alternative feature lighting for atmosphere. For example, I just have one LED downlight over my desk in my bedroom for when I'm working and a lamp each side of my bed for other times, and this is all I need. In my lounge room, I put two pendants, hung at different lengths in one corner of the room as a feature and I have two table lamps for when extra light is needed, but for watching TV or just generally entertaining and relaxing, the two pendants on their own are enough. Like you say, nothing is worse than over lighting a room, it totally loses any atmosphere. Your home theatre for example, could only need two downights for when you need a good light for cleaning and such, otherwise for general use, some wall sconces will give subtle lighting to the room. Have the two types of lights on separate switches naturally. One important thing I always suggest people be mindful of in work areas especially is to place lights so you don't work in your own shadow. One example is the kitchen sink or hotplates - put the light slightly to one side for better visibility.

Comes down to taste/preference of effect and of course budget! Agree that if you select the wrong fitting it can be almost too blinding and overpowering.....strip is great, but individual spots I find are particularly effective and a softer option for highlighting external aspects, of course though it depends upon what you're endeavouring to achieve. My advice is to ensure you invest in quality for external. There is also LED and LED if you know what I mean ;) The quality LED external fitting won't require separate led globes, but is all integrated. You can also get uplights that throw light sideways to avoid the blinding effect like examples belowOther comment is that if you're not 100% sure about how/where to position/what to buy, you may be better to consider a more flexible option of say a spike spot that you can play around with the positioning and direction, and of course move around to elsewhere to highlight other external aspects Black's always a great colour option externally. I think an edge/strip (either pebbles or even soft/garden/mondo grass) particularly to a wall is a good element to include to soften/break-up the extent of hard surfaces. You could always just leave the main pour 15cm short and then fill in the edge strip later either with pebbles or garden depending upon what you think is better....just a long as you rough power cables somewhere there before you do the main section you can sort it out/finalise decisions in due course