Air Plants Go Easy on Indoor Gardeners
If your best intentions leave stalks barely breathing, embrace blissfully easy air plants to bring a living garden to your home
Laura Fenton
22 April 2012
Air plants, a category of plants formally known as epiphytes, get their name from seemingly living on air. Although they appear to require nothing in the way of water or food, air plants actually gather their nutrients and moisture from the atmosphere around them.
While not available at every home garden center, air plants can be found at specialty nurseries and are increasingly easy to find as they grow in popularity. Great for people with self-professed black thumbs, air plants require practically no care. Just be sure that they receive ample sunlight and aren't left in a place where temperatures can dip toward freezing.
While not available at every home garden center, air plants can be found at specialty nurseries and are increasingly easy to find as they grow in popularity. Great for people with self-professed black thumbs, air plants require practically no care. Just be sure that they receive ample sunlight and aren't left in a place where temperatures can dip toward freezing.
Debra Prinzing snapped this impressive shot at the Tropical Plant Indoor Expo. Here, a collection of Tillandsia climb the wall in a unique planter designed by John Lamos for Viducci's Garden USA.
With curving gray-green foliage, Tillandsia xerographica is a versatile air plant that can grow to be quite large.
Anna Marra Flowers' walls are decorated with a few wall-mounted staghorn ferns, making an indoor garden out of the shop's space in the Schoolhouse Electric factory building.
Ceramic wall planters, like these matte white vessels by Shane Powers for West Elm, turn air plants such as staghorn ferns into living art.
Filled with a collection of tiny air plants, these clear glass planters by Shane Powers for West Elm allow you to create a hanging indoor garden. Just be sure to hang them where they'll receive natural light.
When placing air plants into vessels like this glass orb, be sure that the vessel's opening will easily accomodate your plant. If the leaves get dusty, spritz them with a water bottle.
In this sleek bathroom by DKOR Interiors, three staghorn ferms seem to grow out of a wall that is covered in tiles that resemble wood grain. A nearby window provides the quality sunlight that these specimens prefer.
This wooden display by Flora Grubb Gardens showcases a variety of slender-frond air plants. Says Grubb, “Our inspiration was the amazing and unusual qualities of the plants themselves, and their ability to survive without roots, without soil.”
More on Grubb's air plant displays
More on Grubb's air plant displays
Blogger Justina Blakeney displays her air plants in a surprising way: in a pine apothecary chest found in a thrift shop in Los Angeles.
More:
Air Plants for Wall or Tree
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More:
Air Plants for Wall or Tree
The Indoor Gardener: Crazy for Cacti
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Great article Laura. Air plants are so versatile and easy to care for. Your friends will be amazed that your plants are living off the air and water with no messy dirt to deal with. They can be attached to almost anything for interesting and unique decor.
AirPlantShop.Com
I find air plants are actually a little testy to care for. You need to mist them several times a week, but if they are in one of the glass terrariums shown, they need to be taken out and dried for an hour, upside down, to avoid root rot
I wish people would stop with the plastic plants :( they make my soul so sad. Caring for live plants is not that tough! Lets make these more common ὠA