99% of writers who write about indoor plants on the web shouldn't. The vast majority of them simply don't know what they're talking about.
This is one of them. The writer's comments about Ficus trees are amusing, but totally inaccurate. Given adequate light they are one of the toughest plants on the planet.
It would also help if people better understood the benefits of sub-irrigated planters (SIPs aka"self-watering"). They make a major difference in the health of whatever plants you grow, whether decorative or edible.
One of the significant benefits of SIPs for indoor plants is that when watering stress is removed, plants are better able to tolerate lower light conditions.
This was one of the most significant discoveries when we converted to SIPs in my interior plantscaping company back in the '70s. Plants don't like stress any more than we do.
A good way to grow Ficus trees.
Q: Unfashionable plants?
A: If you think Mother Nature is always in vogue, think again. Plants have long come in and out of style, depending on the times. The Victorians, for example, adored exotics like iron plants (Aspidistra elatior) and ferns of all kinds — these were the first things to go when decorator Elsie de Wolfe threw over all things Victorian and invented clean, modern interior design in the late 1800s.
Anyone who remembers the 1970s also remembers the notoriously finicky Ficus tree (died if you looked at it). African violets also had their day in the sunlamp, and we're just edging past the age of "Lucky Bamboo."
What's next on nature's list of decorating hits? Many things green, according to interior forecasters Hermine Mariaux and Patricia Bouley, who saw it coming at the trend-setting Maison et Objet home show in Paris.
"Europe has fallen madly in love with miniature gardens," Mariaux reported to members of the International Furnishings & Design Association (IFDA) in New York. Of special interest to fervent cooks is a wall of growing herbs to keep just outside one's kitchen door for instant "picking, plucking and cooking."
Moss is newly hot "for its sculptural effect"; ditto, cacti, which are "fashionable, not only as plants but also as motifs printed on fabrics and embroidered on curtains." And — black thumbs be warned — Ficus benjamina trees are back in vogue. A trend as short-lived as the trees themselves? We'll see.
Rose Bennett Gilbert is the co-author of "Manhattan Style," "Hampton Style," and five other books on interior design.
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