Hi Steve,
The benefits that you mention for radiant floors apply at least equally for ceilings. You say that the floor option makes sense as you were going to a concrete floor anyway. Since you are worried about having too much thermal mass, it would seem far more logical to eliminate the expensive, heavy concrete floor and go with the ceiling option, which has effectively no thermal mass, if you use a suspended metal radiator surface.
All solid, hard floors will feel colder than an air-containing material like carpet or cork, unless they are heated. Vinyl and wood are about 6 times lower in thermal conductivity than concrete or tiles however, I'm not sure if the difference would be noticeable. If you had ceiling radiant though, the very top surface of the flooring would heat up much more quickly with a low-conductivity material than the tiles would and this could become significant? Do you know anyone with a vinyl or wood bathroom floor who has heat lamps for bathroom heat to see how ceiling radiant would work?
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