I’m an architect and interior designer. My most recent project, a 3,000 s.f. apartment along the lakefront, is near completion.
The master bathroom has a whirlpool tub and 4’ x 6’ shower with 2 waterfall showerheads. Instead of a regular ceiling, skylight panels were used with warm daylight flourescents on dimmers above the panels. I was surprised how nicely this bathroom turned out; it actually does look like daylight coming through the panel (keep in mind the unit is on the 8th floor of a 12 storey building).
As far as LEDs, ropes of LEDs were employed throughout the rest of the apartment, particularly under top and bottom kitchen cabinets. The contractor gave me a “prototype” bulb (no labels except “Made in Japan”) and it has worked very well. When I brought it to Lowe’s and Home Depot to see if they had something similar, the associates at both places wanted to buy it from me.
Warm daylight fluorescents? Easily available warm fluorescents (linear) come in 3000K, at the other end what's known as daylight are anywhere from 5000K (stocked in suppliers) up to 6500K (special order). Warm compacts are usually 2700K. The warm ones are yellow / orange color while the daylight are very cool, kind of blueish. Inexpensive LED's like those sold for outdoor solar lights and Christmas strings are even more cool, that's why the blue look.
I think that mean that youre using linear fluorescents in this panel, compacts don't have the life that you'd want above a bath. Another factor is what system is being used to dim the lamps, standard rotary dimmers will work with the correct ballast but there's usually a buzzing while systems dedicated to dimming (Lutron for one) are much quieter and offer better range.