So you’ve been longing for indoor greenery, and you know that means buying a bunch of houseplants, but you don’t know what type or where to put them?
This guide was written specifically for beginners, with the aim of opening your eyes to the endless possibilities of using plants to decorate the home.
Whether you want to create some overhead drama, make the most of the health benefits, or mess with the color palette, we’ve covered pretty much everything and more.
Style your potted plants with books
You’d be hard pressed to find a single styling guide on this website that doesn’t mention books and we’re not going to end that streak here. They have this uncanny ability to generate tons of visual interest with minimal effort.
So what better way to liven up your scheme than introducing a stack of books and topping it with a potted plant?
This design move will get you that lived-in look in no time at all, while ensuring your favorite houseplant has pride of place over any other decor pieces in the vicinity.
Hang plants from the ceiling
Good interior design has people looking up and down, left and right, and in every nook and cranny the space has to offer.
The “looking up” part is difficult to pull off because we don’t tend to think of the ceiling as a suitable location for decor.
It turns out houseplants are completely in their element when suspended from the ceiling, adding to that sense that you’re walking through an untamed jungle, especially when you opt for a trailing plant that spills over the edges and lets gravity do its thing.
Take advantage of awkward architecture
Yes, it’s challenging to decorate rooms with awkward dimensions and the odd recess here and there, but the worst thing you can do is bury your head in the sand and pretend these unwanted features don’t exist.
If anything, it’s cause for celebration because houseplants are perfectly happy filling the void whether we’re talking about small crevices in the walls or a much larger volume of space over built-in closets and the like.
Remember to push for that organic flair by letting your plants climb and spread out on their own terms.
Greenify your nightstand
Not only do they revitalize the color palette, houseplants come with a whole host of health benefits, from purifying the air to relieving stress and anxiety, so it’s a shame we can’t be accompanied by plants during every waking hour.
However, you can most definitely absorb their health-enhancing properties during every hour spent not awake.
Gather your favorite green friends, keep them close for comfort on your nightstand, and just like that you get to enjoy a restful sleep in lush surroundings while breathing in purified air.
Bring life to a dark corner
A rather nifty trick that seasoned interior designers like to deploy is putting tall objects in the corners so that you can’t really get a sense of the perimeter of the room, which in turn makes it seem bigger than it really is.
Even if you have no concerns about spaciousness, we’ve all got those room corners that appear lifeless and abandoned.
This is why you should invest in a towering houseplant – one with lush green tones and a real sense of vitality – so that no corner in your home is left to rot in the dark.
Let it cascade out of the pot
It may be tempting to give lengthy houseplants some vertical support so that they can stand tall and proud, but doing so robs you of the opportunity to infuse your home with a truly organic aesthetic.
There’s something elegantly casual about a plant that ventures out of its pot and interacts with nearby furniture.
Place a trailing plant on the end of a console table or sideboard and let it throw itself over the edge and it’s safe to say you’ll fall in love with the loose and casual vibes it affords.
Try some juxtaposition
Using too much repetition in your interior design is a one-way ticket to boredom town.
The eye is far more stimulated when it is able to discern between different objects. If everything looks the same then nothing really stands out.
To this end, consider creating a striking contrast with your plant display. Have one plant in a black pot and the other in white, as well as utilizing pots in different sizes and displaying them at varying heights.
Use plants as a coffee table centerpiece
There’s no question that a coffee table left unstyled is a massive no-no, unless of course your intention is to put together a living room scheme that makes guests feel unwelcome! So the real question is, what works well as a coffee table centerpiece?
You guessed it – houseplants have what it takes to elevate your coffee tablescape and the best part is there’s no need to overcomplicate things.
Pick your most aesthetically-pleasing plant and maybe fuss over the plant pot so that everything looks perfect, position it on a tray for some extra dimension, and you’re golden.
Style your shelved plants with stands
Many people view plant stands as being no different to tables and think they belong on the floor like other furniture.
This is a perfectly reasonable setup for plants on the larger side, but what about their baby-sized counterparts that reside higher up?
Indeed, a small potted plant can also benefit from a lovely stand, though not necessarily to help with visibility since they already enjoy nice views from shelves and work surfaces etc.
Use a stand to decorate the display, such as by pairing a porcelain pot with a wooden stand for an interesting clash of materials.
Go high and low
If you want to fully commit to a botanical theme, you need to think about how to introduce greenery at every level – not just your natural sight lines.
It may sound like you have your work cut out, but there are several shortcuts you can take to achieve your own version of an enchanted forest.
For example, you can double the fun when working with tall houseplants by stuffing the base with its own leafy layer.
Give tree branches a new lease of life
When it comes to the pot or planter, see if you can get a theme going by choosing a design that takes its cues from mother nature.
Obviously a tree branch meets this criteria, and it has the added benefit of being a piece of organic decor itself.
If your styling skills were ever in doubt, clearly a plant that resides in a nature-inspired planter will make a pretty definitive statement.
Add flora to a dressing table
When deciding how best to disperse flora and plants around the home, it pays to target those areas where you often find yourself feeling stressed out.
The logic being that your green friends will always be there to lower your blood pressure.
Particularly when you’re getting ready for an important life event such as a job interview or wedding, the dressing table is one such location where stress seems to thrive (some people have beauty stations in their walk-in closet) and thus a big succulent plant should be at the top of your list of must-have dressing table decor.
Work with multiples
If you think a display with just one or two plants is going to have guests oohing and aahing then a serious rethink is in order.
An entire cluster of your organic beauties is more likely to get people talking for the right reasons and this can be facilitated with ease using a multi-plant stand.
And if that doesn’t raise the drama as much as you hoped, opt for a multi-tier plant stand so that you can play around with height to help show off their individuality.
Bookend your couch with a tall plant
Visual balance is a bit of lingo that interior designers use when talking about the relationship between the components of a space and you’re said to have achieved good visual balance when the visual “weight” is distributed evenly.
For instance, you don’t want heavy furniture like a sideboard next to your couch as this will quickly throw the living room off-balance.
A tall, slender plant is much more appropriate, serving only to complement the horizontal flow of the sofa, and just like side tables or end tables it will help create that snug feel if your sofa has lots of open space on either side.
Embrace plant albinism
We know that most people aren’t too keen on reinventing the wheel in how they decorate their homes, whether it’s with plants, art or mirrors. But in the interest of balance, it’s time to placate the risk-seekers out there.
Some plants such as Monstera aren’t great at producing chlorophyll which means their leaves have a habit of turning white.
Instead of pruning them, we say aim for the shock factor and embrace the whiteness. It creates an interesting alternative to that pure greenness everyone is used to, almost like you’ve given your plant a paint job!
Greet yourself with entry table foliage
Some people hate returning to an empty home, whereas others relish the thought of not seeing another person after spending the whole day with their fellow species.
Plants make everyone happy in this regard, because they are living, breathing things that don’t talk.
All the more reason to place one where they’re presence will have the most impact as soon as you walk through the door: on the entry table.
And since plants are so damn good at making a home feel like a home, entryway foliage will go a long way to put guests at ease when they visit your home for the first time.
Angle it off
You wouldn’t place an armchair flush against the wall in the corner as it would make its occupant feel disconnected from the rest of the space.
All living room seating should point toward the center and the same applies to houseplants.
Obviously it makes no difference how you position plants with round pots, but you’ve got to angle off square and rectangle pots to enhance that gravitational pull to the center of the room.
Parking your real-life organisms neatly in the corner won’t really make them feel part of the family.
Be space-conscious with a transparent plant pot
Desperate to pop your plants on the floor to bring about a cool and relaxed vibe, but you live in a compact space and don’t want to take up precious square footage?
Fret not as it’s possible to create amazing displays at floor-level while giving the impression of not eating up any floor space.
Impression being the operative word because it does involve a little trickery. Go with a transparent vessel such as a glass vase as this has the effect of leaving a smaller footprint as far as the eye is concerned.
Impress with an off-center aesthetic
If you’ve read our posts on art above the bed or mirrors above the couch, you’ll know how much emphasis we place on organic arrangements, which is essentially arranging something the way nature would.
So if you have a long surface that you’d love to adorn with leafy greenery, make it look natural and organic by targeting the ends as opposed to the center, as this is considerably more pleasing to the eye.
Oh and don’t forget to create a waterfall effect over the edge for that extra flair.
Spruce up your bedroom dresser
We all have a habit of using every surface in the bedroom as a dumping ground for miscellaneous items and the bedroom dresser is no exception.
It’s totally fine to have designated areas for your odds and sods, but at least show some respect for your furniture and use a tray to help wrangle clutter.
Then polish it off with a cute houseplant to indulge the senses and hopefully distract people away from your pile of mess.
Consider the mood of the room
Different rooms carry different moods and this should be taken into account as you decorate your home with houseplants. It’s also a great way to demonstrate some nuance in your styling skills.
As a case in point, the bathroom is a space for heightened relaxation and as such it’s wise to decorate it with a spa-like sensation in mind. Think rocks in the sink, or more pertinently to this topic, rocks in a transparent plant pot.
Dare we say your own little rock pool will steal the limelight from the plant above it?
Oxygenate your home gym
One part of the home that can always do with a glorious hit of nature from both a functional and aesthetic point of view is the home gym.
The aesthetics come into play during a strenuous workout routine when it helps to have something rich in texture to rest your gaze upon.
Perhaps more importantly, a dominant houseplant will also oxygenate the space and help you catch your breath as you gasp for air after smashing your PB on the treadmill.
Fill a shelf
We’ve already touched on wall planters that allow your plants to become the main event on vertical surfaces, but sometimes it’s nice to let them mix with all kinds of decor on a bookshelf. Variety is the spice of life, after all.
What’s more, if you display a potted trailing plant on the top shelf so that it cascades over items below, you’ll thank yourself for the ton of depth and dimension that follows.
Just remember to double check that your bookshelves receive enough direct light for plants to thrive in.
Take to the walls
Most rooms have one ceiling, one floor and four walls, so it’s rather curious that a lot of plant parents don’t take full advantage of all that wall space and try their hand at creating some amazing vertical gardens.
In fact, forget about a fully fledged garden on the wall (that’s a conversation for another day), even the simple act of hanging up a wall planter will do a world of good in terms of making your home look and feel decorated.
Focus on the vessel
Your potting options are literally endless, so it’s very easy to find something that marries well with your plant and fits into the interior design of your home.
For the best results, ask yourself what the prevailing atmosphere of your home is, or what you’d like it to be, and use that information to inform your choice of pot.
For example, basket pots lend a relaxed vibe whereas ceramic vases and vessels will shift the energy to one that’s a little more classy and formal.
Enjoy a boost in productivity
At one point the idea of filling corporate offices with greenery and transforming them into mini jungles was gathering a lot of momentum.
Then all of a sudden the world changed and now everyone with a desk job is working from home.
But this is even better news for plant enthusiasts because you have more creative control when it comes to decorating your own home office.
Even if you’re not so enthusiastic about plants, just know that working alongside these whole other life-forms is scientifically proven to boost productivity levels.
Reduce the black box effect
When the TV is switched off, you’re left with an eyesore. That’s why we’ve compiled a list of ideas for decorating around the TV, ensuring you can hit the ‘off’ button without fear of ruining the room’s scheme.
Plants should be your go-to decor for minimizing the big black box effect because they offset the features of a television set in terms of color, texture and shape.
To be on the safe side, aim for quantity. This way, when you stop watching your favorite show, the real show begins – one that’s based on nature and is immersive and full of vitality.
Bring interest to your windowsills
It’s a space that is out of the way, sits comfortably within your sight line, and is bathed in plenty of sunlight, so you’d be forgiven for thinking windowsills were created for the sole purpose of displaying your houseplants!
It really is a fail-safe location, perfect for new plant parents and botanical experts alike, and a great way to dress up a dull windowsill.
Just note that some plants fair better in direct light than others, so don’t think you can put anything on there and expect it to flourish, as like humans they can get sunburned.
Show off a pretty pattern
When you want to inject a splash of greenery into your home, look no further than the humble houseplant. However, many people don’t realize they can enlist the help of plants to bring fun patterns into their interiors, too.
Take Maranta leuconeura as an example, which has distinctive veining on its leaves in the form of a herringbone pattern. This tropical specimen is also known as a prayer plant as the leaves fold up like praying hands at night.
Offering lush green tones and a burst of pattern in equal measure, it certainly performs miracles as home decor.