Designer Houseplants | plants used in Interior Design

i’m a college student renting places and would love to see advice on how to make rooms pretty when they’re carpeted and maybe don’t have the best lighting!! it’s been a struggle

Currently I have 3 🌳 that I use like dividers: one from the hallway to the bedroom (ficus elastica, branched out), two between the office and the livingroom (hibiscus red dragon, branched out, super tall; and a dracaena marginata on a metal stand that I also used as a display for other smaller plants that sit on top of the soil). I did this cause those are literally the only places where the trees would fit 😂 so I'm glad to hear they're ✨interior design✨. I grew all three from cuttings. Edit: I just realized my pachira aquatica is close to outgrowing its corner and I also have a false aralia (was schaefflera elegantissima, was reclasified, I can't remember the new name) that is super tiny now... but will grow into a tree. 🙂

ficus umbellata and large bird of paradise are classic as well

I cannot wait for the Japan videos. Benji, you may not be aware, but you have become so much more relaxed, and confident, and at ease with all this. You are doing so well! I rely on YT videos to quiet my mind and help me deal with things. Your videos are the first ones I seek out. Thank you.

Love that spiritus sancti sitting quietly as a background

I work at a nursery that occasionally sells shady lady trees and I'm the one who takes care of them in a commercial setting. From what I've seen, these things are marketed as indoor plants and are even grown in the same greenhouse conditions that most of our other houseplants come from for a majority of their life. When they come in however, I always move them outside to our shaded patio room that is covered by a roof with skylights, but is still an outdoor area. These guys really seem to prefer being outdoor getting some wind blown through them and seem to stagnate when I bring them indoors for staging. I would say it thrives best as an outdoor patio tree, but with enough acclimation and assuming it was originally grown in a greenhouse environment, I see no reason it could be fully indoors granted it gets PLENTY of light. One other thing to note is that it is one of the most frequently returned indoor trees that I see in the nursery due to them not being cared for correctly.

Last Sunday I was wondering “Where’s benjis video??” I’m so excited :))

Australian here. I have a 2m bottle tree with a gorgeous swollen trunk. Yet it WILL NOT survive inside for no longer that a few days. Another stage plant.

I took care of two giant black olive trees in a shop I worked at, they're a lot like fiddle leaf figs. Needs bright indirect light and regular watering or else they drop all their leaves.

This video has made me curious as to what commonly used houseplants look like out in nature, could be a good video subject!

I have a Brachychiton rupestris that I grew from seed three years ago and I'm very satisfied with it. In this short time span it reached a height of two meters with beautiful leaves in the same small pot of like 20 centimeters of diameter in which I originally sow it. This year in late spring I decided to prune it (both roots and trunk) and repot it in the same pot with fresh soil and only two weeks after it was already full of 5 new branches and leaves which is awesome. It's also incredibly drought-tolerant, you can leave it with bone-dry soil for two weeks whenever you want and I doesn't drop a single leaf!

I love that you included plants used in Asian interior design, bc they add their own style and sensibility to Western design, which I love.

Thanks Benji. I’m so inspired!!! I’m from Australia and I know native plants here have to have different fertilisers and soil. We have specialised ones for native plants. Just a warning for anyone buying the bottle tree.

This is exactly the biophilic design interior. I'd like to use houseplants as an element for interior design. You did a great job!

I'm so happy to see Brachychiton mentioned in relation to houseplants! I never have before and they are by far my favourite houseplant. I've been growing them from seed for over 20 years and have found them to be the most beautiful and easy to look after plants :) They take ages to get big and start getting that delicious gnarled root system even after a couple of years. xx

My fiddleleaf fig used to be a column form, which i did not want. It took me years to get it to branch out, until finally, in frustration, i just put it outside somewhat under a tree to get partial sun during the summer, and watered it way more often than i ever did when it was inside. Within months it branched off. Four branches, and then multiple branches off of those branches. Coildnt be happier with it 😅

I’m currently growing pomegranates and loquats from seed—it’s taking quite a bit of time 😅 I like loquats because they have fuzzy leaves, and the fruit is absolutely delicious (I know, I’m going to have to wait like three years haha).

I know they’re basic, but my money tree and norfolk pine are getting so large, they’re beautiful

I recently discovered your YouTube channel and I’m obsessed with it. Lovely plants, clean esthetic. I’m just in love.

You have definitely done a lot of research on these ‘decorative house trees’, Benji! Most of them seem to be so unfamiliar to I am sure many of us! So thanks for sharing! And have a wonderful trip to Japan!!! 😀