Vertical gardening in the interior

To live in harmony with nature is the aspiration of a modern person, which more and more requires its embodiment. Since ancient times, people have tried to surround themselves with beautiful vegetation and fragrant flowers. Long winters in countries with cold climates encouraged the establishment of indoor gardens and greenhouses, where you could enjoy the green of plants year-round. In the modern world, in urban conditions, when a person is often almost completely cut off from nature, his own home garden becomes especially desirable.

In addition to aesthetics, living plants help to improve the microclimate in the home. They function as an air conditioner, air purifier and humidifier, and protect against extraneous sounds. It is noticed that in a room with a large number of plants, the air temperature is several degrees below the surrounding space. There is a group of plants that, due to the release of phytoncides, have a healing effect on the air. Others absorb harmful impurities, deposit particles of dust and soot on themselves. Pay attention to how much water you use to water your indoor flowers. This, already alive, water returns to the surrounding air through the leaves, increasing the humidity in our apartments, preventing the development of respiratory diseases.

The size of modern apartments does not allow many to grow a large number of plants. You can, of course, confine yourself to placing several large-sized ones, which will also delight the eye. But there are ways to green up a room without taking up a lot of space, you just have to master the high-rise component of our dwellings, adapt all the inconvenient corners and walls. Our grandparents decorated the walls with carpets, but now it is customary to create green walls and paintings, living screens and partitions from fresh flowers. It is stylish, beautiful, unusual and useful. There are companies that specialize in creating wall compositions, however, they can be made with your own hands, only a little desire, imagination and love for plants are required.

The easiest way to compactly place plants is to install narrow, elegant racks that will take up only a few centimeters of area, but will decorate and liven up a large wall. If you organize the lighting, you can grow on them almost all your favorite ornamental deciduous plants and those that can bloom under artificial light, such as uzambara violets, episodes, abutilones, etc. On a shelf 30-40 cm wide and 120-130 cm long is enough one fluorescent lamp 120 cm long and 40 Watt, placed at a height of 40-60 cm.

There is always a place above the aquarium where a shelf with plants that prefer moist air will stand. Plants require additional lighting in winter, but by providing them with light, at the same time we help ourselves, thereby fighting winter depressions. The most progressive solution in this case is the use of special LED lamps that consume little electricity and are not harmful to eyesight (there are even those that allow you to adjust the radiation spectrum in accordance with the requirements of specific crops). However, today, such lighting will be quite expensive, so replacing the bulbs in the lamps with less efficient, but acceptable for plants, energy-saving fluorescent lamps, which still allows you to keep flowers even in the darkest places, would be an acceptable option. Subject to 12-hour daylight hours, 7-10 luminescent watts per 1 sq. meter room will help shade-tolerant plants survive in winter. For plants that are more demanding on light, as well as if the light source is more than 2 meters away, it is better to install individual spot lighting using small wall lamps with fluorescent energy-saving lamps.Adjusting the length of daylight hours is easy with household timers, which will turn on and off without your participation. It is very important for plants that the photoperiod is not disturbed, the light is turned on and off every day at the same time. Set the timer to light up the plants from 8 am to 8 pm, and the plants will receive a neutral 12-hour daylight hours.

Particularly whimsical specimens that require high humidity will feel best in shallow wall florariums under glass. Here you can plant some types of capricious, but very beautiful philodendrons, rare exotic species of monsters and anthuriums, so you will create a unique collection at home without taking away useful space. These florariums are sold ready-made:

Instead of ordinary glass inserts on the doors, you can make stained glass windows with green climbing plants; climbing philodendrons, ivy, scindapsus are suitable here; they are planted in hanging pots attached directly to the doors. Plants should be shade-tolerant and tolerant of short-term drying out of the substrate. They can also be used to decorate arches and doorways, to create vertical living walls.

Without taking up space, you can place hanging plants along the eaves of the window, in a planter without holes, so that water does not leak during watering. Plants need to be resistant to short periods of drying out of the substrate so that caring for them does not cause unnecessary trouble. Hoyis, nephrolepis, scindapsus, aeschinanthus, philodendrons, epiphyllums, columneas, hatiors, etc. are suitable here. Even on very light southern windows, almost all of these plants will grow in hanging pots, and the upper part of the frame will serve as a visor protecting them from sunburn. Aeschinanthus, columbus, hoyi will actively bloom at the same time.

Blinds and curtains will replace climbing plants - in a few months they will independently, clinging to stretched strings or a net, braid the entire window. These plants must tolerate intense light without shading. Flowering and decorative leafy passionflowers, planted in large containers, are suitable here. In the form of a living tulle, linear hoya, dyschidia, ceropegia, and ripsalis will hang beautifully.

There are quite a few plants that grow and flower well under artificial light without requiring natural light. In a dark corridor or hallway, having made a backlight, you can place a wall collection of episodes - plants with very decorative leaves and cute flowers; in a dark niche under the lamp, a collection of precious orchids will look very stylish in a glass container, their leaves sparkle and shimmer like exquisite jewelry.

Anywhere, as a design element, a vertical green wall or a living picture, a cascade of flowers will look good. The composition should be harmonious and unpretentious, therefore, when selecting plants, several rules must be observed. The painting requires a combination of plants in size, color, leaf texture. It is desirable that they be bushy, without a pronounced trunk, approximately the same in height. Ornamental deciduous plants are usually used. Often they include various bromeliads (tillandsia, guzmania, vriezia), which bloom for a long time, give bright color spots, but after a while they will need to be replaced.

You can create a living wall from a monoculture (one type of plant), for example, painted scindapus, episodes, sheffler or fittonia. Anthuriums and spathiphyllums, located in clear rows, will look beautiful. You can make a strict geometric composition by placing taller plants in the center and low ones at the edges; combine several types of plants in an artistic mess. A tapestry of plants with varied foliage is periodically supplemented with flowering specimens that can completely change the mood of the entire room.For family celebrations, green walls will be decorated with cut flowers in test tubes, giving them an elegant and festive look.

Usually, vertical compositions are located at some distance from the window, so the plants that make up them should tolerate some shading well and not lose their decorative effect under artificial light, as well as put up with possible short periods of drought. It is advisable to select plants with approximately the same watering needs, although this is not necessary, it is enough to plant similar plants in one container. The containers can be watered on their own schedule, each time, or through irrigation, while adjusting the amount of water so that the substrate is ready to water in a week. Good, lush specimens should be planted in the composition.

For use in a live picture, you can recommend:

• low varieties of aglaonema, especially decorative red-leaved varieties;
• medium-sized varieties of spathiphyllums, they are unpretentious and beautiful even without flowers;
• Fatsias are green and variegated, which tolerate drought well and are very resistant;
• ferns polypodiums and aspleniums;
• chlorophytums "Green Orange" and "Bonnie", they are decorative and grow well;
• sansivieres, they can be placed even next to heating devices;
• syngoniums, scindapsus, fleshy green and variegated hoyu, ivy philodendron - these ampelous plants take root well in a living picture and can be used to decorate the sides.

The listed plants have worked well over a long period of time. Very decorative, but require regular rest, royal begonias, which have a large variety of varieties. For example, I can cite a simple structure that is easily assembled on its own and functions well. The size of the composition is 120x65 cm, it consists of individual pots, arranged in 6 rows of 3 pieces each. Hanging kitchen containers and curtain rods purchased from IKEA were used. One or two plants are planted in each container of 3 liters (15x20x15), depending on its splendor and the size of the pot (10 and 15 cm in diameter). Hanging containers were hung on the main cornices, which were attached to wooden rails embedded in the wall. The distance between the guides is 20 cm, it is equal to the width of the container. The main cornices are removed from the wall by about 10 cm.For insurance and giving the desired angle of inclination of the planter, additional lower cornices were made, for which the planters are filled, they are removed from the wall by about 7.5 cm.The distance between the main cornices is about 20 cm. Distance parameters from the wall and the distance between the eaves can be changed, achieving the desired angle of inclination of the planter. The design is easy to install and maintain. The containers are sealed, easy to remove and put on, there is no water drain from them, the wall is not exposed to moisture and is not contaminated. About once a week, you need to remove the containers, inspect the plants, water and return to their place. The grooming time is approximately 30-40 minutes per week. It is helpful to gently shower the plants every few months. If necessary, you can replace the plants in the container or the entire container, move the weakened plant to another place and allow it to recover.

To complete the wall composition, an aquarium with aquatic plants and fish is placed below. This green painting is collected in the wall near the southeast window. In summer, when selecting shade-tolerant plants, additional illumination is not required; in winter, the picture must be supplemented.

Usually, green pictures are illuminated with fluorescent or LED lamps, remote on the brackets. In this case, such illumination did not fit into the interior and was replaced by a central ceiling lamp with fluorescent energy-saving lamps, operating 12 hours a day (45 watts turned out to be enough at a distance of 1.5 meters).

Having decided on landscaping an apartment, this should be done gradually, measuring strength and free time with the number of flowers. It is better to have a small rack or one living picture, but in a good, well-groomed condition - only in this case the plants will bring joy.However, it should be noted that with an increase in the number of flowers in the room, it becomes relatively easier to care for them - the more there are, the more stable the microclimate created by them, the better the plants feel, the less energy is needed to maintain them in good condition.

Finally, a few booths from Chelsea 2011, which once again demonstrated the growing popularity of vertical gardening. These living walls, created specifically for the exhibition, also use outdoor plants, but today's range of indoor plants allows you to choose a replacement for them in accordance with the texture, color and graphics of the foliage. We hope these photos will give a good boost to your imagination.