floradania.dk 38/2014

Article: Clean air at home with green plants
International living magazines focus on living homes with lots of room for green plants. Both the modern apartments in the big cities, the mansions and the family homes- and separate houses and rustic lofts with a creative atmosphere inspire both city singles and families with children to play with nature and the indoor styling 
Green plants are trendy in the interior decoration and they represent good opportunities for creating cosy green oases in the living room, kitchen and bedroom. At the same time the indoor climate is boosted. 

The old fashioned pot plants like Mother-in-law's tongue, Begonia, Sander's dracaena, Peace lily and Spider plant are back and indispensable in creating an extraordinary and healthy home.
-	Mix the plants 

stresses interior stylist, life style journalist and trend spotter Lene Ostenfeldt, who writes about international design and interior decorating for the Danish newspaper Dagbladet Børsen. She continues
-	It is simply too boring with only a couple of pots in the window. I mix and buy different types of plants, sorts and colours and create groups on the floor, in one side of the window sill, on the dinner table and on open kitchen shelves. It gives a bohemian style and a lively impression like a vigorous green house. 

-	In my home and on my work place you can easily see that I am fully occupied with a lot of different creative activities during the day. The green areas gives peace for both the eye and the soul and unites furniture and accessories that I have either inherited or bought as new and transformed into something else. The beautiful contrast and the personal emerge when something new is mixed with old or used stuff. The old potted plants are perfect for modern interior decorating. 

According to Lene it does not require a whole lot to arrange the plants,
-	Both the plastic pots from the nurseries, rustic clay pots and bowls, pots and trays from the kitchen cabinets are ideal items for planting. Danish nurseries use a lot of time and resources on the development of plant types, on how to take care of the green plants and that the plants, the roots and the soil are as healthy as possible. Therefore it does not require so much to take care of the oases at home. Especially not when you can water in groups and the plants are easy to reach with the watering can and you can collect a dry leaf here and there.

Lene continues 
-	When I fall in love with a green plant, I don't always have a pot to match my plant so I collect all my pots and plant in one of these. Make sure to add some gravel or clay pebbles in the bottom of the pot so the roots are kept dry. 

Place a group of white vases of glass, clay or marble and play with materials, sizes and the different green colours of the plants, put small plants in large vases and large plants in small vases. My preserving jars get a new life in a group with new types of Spider plants with dark green and mixed leaves, where you can see the roots through the glass.

The old Danish plants like Painted-leaf begonias, Ivy or Common Ivy, Asparagus and Devil's ivy continue to grow in the kitchen. Lene Ostenfeldt has used a cheap steel bookcase from the builders merchant and has filled the shelves with kitchen utensils and a lot of potted plants. The plants give a nice and vigorous contrast to dark colours, steel, porcelain and the black wall that is painted with lacquer for blackboards. Lene made her own personal enlarged leaf with chalk.