12 Ways to Enjoy Plants Indoors

Botanical Place Cards

These cute botanical place cards use evergreen stems and succulents to add a bit of botanical bounty to your get together. They would work well for Christmas, but why stop there? They’d be great for any winter gathering. If your event is more casual, skip the place cards and just use the plants to decorate your table. Watch the DIY to make your own botanical place cards.

Caladiums as Houseplants and Cut Flowers

Heart to Heart^® Caladiums are quite flexible plants. They are obviously great outdoors in summer gardens, but you can also enjoy these colorful foliage plants for months in bright areas of your home. You could plant them by themselves in a container, but you might also try choosing a few houseplants to mix with your Heart to Heart caladiums. We used a Boston fern and croton in our mixed houseplant container above. You can also use Heart to Heart caladium stems in cut flower arrangements where they will last for a week or more in water. They lend a tropical feel to your home, which is especially nice to see on a cold winter's day.

Dining Table Centerpieces

Cut greens are a wonderful way to create a table centerpiece for the holidays. This simple, straightforward option can be created with a wide array evergreens like the Soft Serve^® Chamaecyparis you see here. Add candles, bulbs, figurines, pine cones and berry stems to make the arrangement festive.

Also above, you'll see some shallow wire baskets that have been lined with moss and planted up with live plants like Echeveria, String of Pearls, miniature Jade and Berried Treasure Red strawberry plants. This basket planter centerpiece should last for about a month before you'll need to repot the plants into something more permanent. That will give you plenty of time to prep them before your event and break them down afterwards. We'll show you a closer look at the miniature terrariums you see here near the end of this article. 

Fall Tablescape

This display uses the colorful foliage of Primo^® 'Black Pearl' coral bells as an anchor to showcase white pumpkins, gourds and dried hydrangeas, creating an elegant tableau. Get creative! There are so many directions you can go with this kind of display. Look for ways to incorporate some of your favorite natural materials like cut stems, dried flowers and gourds in your indoor arrangements and tablescapes. Adding things like candles, a favorite book or beloved keepsakes could make the setting meaningful to you and your family.

Front Window Houseplants

If you have a bright window, showcase your favorite houseplants on an interesting accent table accented with items repurposed from other areas of your house to create an indoor paradise for the wintertime. A lush houseplant display will help to chase the winter blues away. By adding seating of some kind near your collection of indoor plants, you'll be able to enjoy these mood-lifters up close. A comfy chair and a favorite book seems just about right. Learn more about how to create a botanical retreat at home.

Dress Up Your Indoor Containers

Laura of Garden Answer used a simple packet of gold leaf sheets from a craft store to dress up these plain terra cotta containers which show off her petite houseplants. To keep your costs down on this DIY project, use small pots similar in size to the gold leaf you select. Grouping them all together on a tray creates an interesting collection and makes it easy to move them around your house to try different growing conditions.  

Holiday Mantlescape

This simply elegant mantlescape and hearthside scene uses all natural materials harvested from the garden or picked up from a garden center. Red twig dogwood stems, evergreen Arborvitae boughs, and dried panicle and smooth hydrangeas rest atop the mantle and fill the vase next to the fireplace (be sure to keep a safe distance.) Ivory poinsettias fill in the rest of the space with their snowy blooms. Red or rose-colored poinsettias could be used instead if that's more your style. 

Creative Kokedama

"Kokedama" is a centuries-old Japanese form of bonsai. ‘Koke’ means ‘moss,’ and ‘dama’ means ‘ball. So, moss ball. Instead of using a container, the soil and plant are held by this moss ball. See how to make them here. To water, simply soak the ball in the sink when it is dry. Kokedama balls are fun projects to make as gifts for family or your plant-loving friends, or to display around your own home all year long. 

Spa Day Everyday

Some plants love warm, humid environments like bathrooms. It doesn’t take much to incorporate a few houseplants there and give the room an upscale vibe. Wouldn't it be nice to be surrounded by green in the morning as you got ready to start your day? Check out our new SpaScene^® collection of leafjoy^® houseplants which features plants that will thrive in moist, humid environments.

Desktop Beauty

In small spaces, the simple addition of a bud vase with a dried bloom or a petite vase of fresh flowers plucked from the garden are easy ways to enjoy your plants indoors. Laura of Garden Answer went further by making floral paperweights for her desk using dried flowers from her garden. See how plants were used three different ways in this small scene? Altogether, they make the space feel more your own. 

Simple Abundance

Monochromatic arrangements are one of the easiest color schemes to create. Here, we used the cut stems of both Arctic Fire^® and Arctic Sun^® dogwood shrubs to fill a vase on the mantle and coupled with with a low slung bowl of pomegrantes and artichokes from the grocery store. Cut stems of Berry Heavy^® winterberry holly complete the look. You might also try using apples, oranges, avocados, fat purple grapes, a coconut Dragon Fruit, and coffee or vanilla beans in your arrangements. 

Terrific Terrariums

Terrariums are another trending way to enjoy your plants indoors. We'll teach you all about them and show you what supplies you'll need to make one of your own here. You could use a simple glass bottle to make a terrarium, but reinventing a found object into one is an exciting way to fill it with life. The substrate you use as a base in the bottom of your vessel is important as it helps to avoid disease, so be sure to follow those steps carefully. Once they are set up properly, they only need occasional spritzes of water to keep them happy.  

If you love plants, you probably don’t want to spend all winter without having them around. You can see that growing houseplants are a great option, but there are many different ways to use plants indoors. We hope you found one or two new ideas to keep on growing this winter! 

Go further:

Learn more about our leafjoy houseplants.

Explore outdoor decorating ideas.

Seek out more DIY projects