Starting with rooms which have great atmosphere, the trick is to use plants which work with existing features and not against them. A low-ceilinged, Elizabethan timber-framed house looks entirely wrong filled with palms, monsteras or other tropical plants. Simpler, softer subjects such as pelargoniums, cyclamen, begonias and ivies have much more the right feel and don’t clash with the traditional atmosphere. Similarly a cool high-tech city interior might look very strange with small fussy plants; the scale and simplicity would demand plants which are large and dramatic and make bold statements themselves. This is a case for a beaucarnia or a big Dracaena marginata or an aphelandra, whose marvellous graphic markings remove any chance of it being ignored. A sunny summery room in any type of house could be made to feel like a conservatory by using plenty of bright green foliage and maybe hanging baskets at the windows. An old-fashioned wire plant stand could be put to proper use and stacked with ferns and other graceful plants and, to carry the theme further, furniture in the room could be made from wicker or cane or simply painted white and covered with a fresh green-and-white print fabric. A tiled or plain wood floor or pale carpet would complete the scheme perfectly, a particularly suitable solution for a dining or breakfast room.
Many people live in houses built in Victorian times and nowadays, thank goodness, most owners are keen to keep the original features, often going as far as to replace in the style of the period things which were removed in the days of boarding over and covering up. Many fabrics and wallpaper designs are suitable for this style of house, and furniture which fits in with the character is not difficult to find. Palms and ferns were great favourites with the Victorians as was the aspidistra, one of the few plants which could survive smoky polluted city air and gas fumes. They were so common in Victorian days that for a long time afterwards they were largely ignored. They are remarkably long lived and a good well- grown specimen, particularly one of the new variegated forms, looks magnificent in a decorative cachepot as the centrepiece to a Victorian-style living room.
The country-house style might sound far too grand for most of us but if your taste in furniture is traditional and includes loose- covered sofas and chairs with rugs on the floor then you may be part of the way there. Add an azalea or a bowlful of cyclamen and in the summer place a standard fuchsia near a window. Orange trees have just the right feel about them too, as does any plant which looks as if it has just come, beautifully cosseted, from the greenhouse. Scented- leaved pelargoniums are perfect and bowls full of flowering bulbs in winter create a feeling of tradition and comfort which with a little time and space is easy to copy. Pot your plants into old terracotta pots if you can find them — plastic looks completely out of place.
The Eastern look
If your taste in interiors is simple and spare, influenced perhaps by the Japanese tradition, then choose your plants carefully and make them an important part of the complete scheme. The art of growing bonsai trees has recently become popular in this country but you can only expect to keep plants treated in this way indoors for short periods of time as they require normal outdoor seasonal weather conditions toreally thrive. Grow instead a Japanese azalea or a soft-leaved plant such as Philodendron bipinnatifidum which has the look of a Japanese water-garden plant. Red flowers too seem to strike the right note, perhaps an Anthurium scherzerianum in flower or an Asiatic lily, or a single brilliant scarlet amaryllis. The Japanese love to use iris in their flower arrangements and any plant with tall narrow strap-shaped leaves would also provide the right effect. There are several plants to look out for such as Rhoeo spathacea or the narrower leaved dracaenas.
In complete contrast to the pared-down Eastern style, you may prefer more glamour and comfort, and nothing helps more towards a feeling of luxury and hedonism than flowers and plants with beautiful perfumes. Many of these appear but a few with really spectacular scent are worth mentioning here. Lilium regale, which is one of the best lilies for pot culture, has a magnificent scent and so does L. longiflorum, another white one. On a warm summer evening they will scent the whole room. The stephanotis is also a highly scented plant and again has white flowers. Although it is probably best grown in a conservatory many houses will have conditions suitable for it. The jasmine commonly grown as a houseplant also has a powerful fragrance and, like the lily and the stephanotis, it has a wonderful exotic feel about it. There are many other plants which have lovely scents such as the hyacinth but somehow their fragrance is more homely and simple without the slightly mysterious overtones of the other three.
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