The Green Apartment

Adding some green to your apartment is an exciting experience and a great opportunity to harmonize your living space and organize a cozy green area that simulates a bit of the outdoors and it relaxes you all at the same time.
However, plants do not only decorate the house, but also purify and humidify the air space; green color beneficially effects the nervous system and relieves stress.
There are numerous ways to add green to your apartment and they are easy to implement in your home so that you can easily hide from the concrete jungle in a green wonderland of your own. What’s more, home landscaping is a fascinating process which allows you to realize your creative abilities and where you receive a lot of good feelings once you’re surrounded by you indoor nature creation.

1.Grow herbs and spices
Of course, the ideal diet should include fresh herbs, but in winter the choice is not particularly large: you still can easily find the parsley, cilantro and dill, but, for example, basil, thyme, mint, oregano, rosemary and other herbs are often sold dried. But why should you depend on weather conditions if you can grow everything at home?
First, fresh herbs will always be on hand, and second, know that it’s very affordable to have an active indoor herb garden. Third, it is nutritionally useful, because it maximizes the availability of natural vitamins and minerals – those necessary substances for the body in their freshest form. And fourth, aromatic herbs on the window sill will be a piece of summer regardless of what the weather’s like outside.
Many herbs are used not only in cooking. Aromatic herbs in fresh and dried form can be added to the bath – for example, lavender, peppermint, chamomile, sage or verbena; you can make a sachet of dried herbs to put in the closet to give clothes a pleasant aroma; you can make a face mask with herbs or rinse hair with a decoction of chamomile, sage and nettle.

2.Grow fruits and vegetables in containers
Perhaps winter mini-garden on the window sill wouldn’t solve the food problem in a particular family, but certainly would be a great example where you can combine business with pleasure. And it will surely add charm to your decor!
In fact, if you grow some potted plants, why not to make them useful and delicious? The list of plants that are easy to grow in an apartment is large enough: both greens of all sorts and salads, cucumbers and tomatoes and even citrus trees.

3.Amazing succulents and cacti
Succulents are always chic and in vogue. The variety of styles and colours works even for people with the biggest design ambitions. They are lovely, cheap and easy to keep. Currently it is very popular to make mini-gardens with succulents and cacti.
Plants bring natural beauty and vitality into any living place. With its “juicy” leaves and stems, succulents do not require special care and look great both singly and as companions to other plant families.
Their best feature is that even an inexperienced grower can plant and grow them. In addition, they live well with each other, so you can plant different types of succulents and cacti together and combine them with other plants to create delightful compositions.
Easy to clean and beautiful to admire, succulents can nevertheless have a significant impact on the design of the interior. Using succulents of varying height and shape of leaves, you can give the room visual interest and unusual structure. And thanks to the ability to survive in the toughest conditions, these plants are often used to decorate not only the window sills, but also uncomfortable corners of rooms and even the ceiling beams.

4. Variation of potted plants
Humanity started growing plants 5000 years ago. Why do we need potted plants? Of course, the flowers really make our homes cozy, creating a comfortable atmosphere, binging the interior space alive and certainly making it attractive. But in recent years scientists have discovered that potted flowers are needed in each apartment not only for comfort. In indoor air due to various reasons toxic substances are accumulated: they are produced by different indoor materials, detergents, tap water, cigarette smoke and the air entering from the street that is not always clean and safe.
Electromagnetic radiation, bacteria and dried air is also not good for our health or skin. Certain types of potted plants can actually cope with all of these problems. Plus, they sooth your temper!
So, if you still doubt whether it’s a waste of your time watering and replanting potted flowers, think no more! Just choose the types, colors and shapes you like and use your imagination to create an indoor garden that will protect you!

5. Simple Garden by Click & Grow
Useful and simple technology has reached gardening too. If you are a fan of hi-tech toys and have some money, this way is totally for you. It is also for lazy people, which we all are)
This device will do everything, you just need a couple of batteries and some water. Click the gadget to start and admire how your tomatoes grow quickly and without your lifting a finger.

6. Order fresh flowers
Simple yet effective and a beautiful method to liven up your apartment. Unfortunately, fresh flowers do not live long, but with proper care, they can please you for quite some time; some up to a few weeks.
Some people believe that only big bouquets will look beautiful. In fact, the most important is what flowers are chosen, in what combinations of form and color and how they are placed in the room.
Making a bouquet, you need to place flowers freely, it will better highlight the beauty of each flower. Do not stick to dull symmetry, try to find the most fantastic color combinations. If you’re run out of ideas just order an already prepared bouquet.

7. Create diy terrarium
A terrarium is a composition of plants in a container made of glass or transparent plastic. To create it you can use a variety of vessels – aquariums, vases, jars, and even bottles. In a glass terrarium container easy to create a favorable climate with high humidity and with no drafts and temperature changes. Terrariums can optimize the growing of delicate tropical plants.
The closed vessel evaporates moisture so you don’t have to water such creations too often, which is obviously a great plus. The easiest way is to create a composition of cacti and succulents as they look great and are good companions for each other.

You can create terrariums in a natural style, imitating the area of wildlife or in decorative one – composition with multicolored pebbles, houses, dried flowers and potted flowers.

Walking in the woods or in gardens collect some natural material like sticks, stones, dried leaves, cones and moss. Terrariums are easy to take care of so this option of adding green is ideal for people who often leave their homes for a few days or even weeks at a time.

8. Add some zest with air plants
Air plants are the most inspirational and phenomenal plants for your interior design. They have little or no root system and absorb the nutrients and water from the air. So you don’t need any pots with soil or vessels with water to plant them! You can place them on any surface you like – snag, shell, stone, wire, plastic, glass.
They also do not require strong lighting. Therefore, the composition can be placed not on the window sills but in almost any location you choose. You have freedom to act!
Still, do not forget that these plants “drink water” from air so it’s better not to place them in closed glass vases with no ventilation.

9. Boost green with flowerboxes
French designers Philippe Tisserand and Thibaut de Breyne are pretty ingenious guys who created an amazing Flowerbox concept. Flowerbox began its existence only in 2005 and has already successfully won the favor of many hearts.
It is an elegant combination of exquisite design and brilliantly simple flower arranging. Plants of special substrate are planted in a very elegant colored boxes and can be positioned vertically on the wall as paintings or put on the table.
There is a huge variety of styles and flowers, actually you can even design your own flowerbox using simple boxes or tubes and flowers you like.

10. Arrange flowers in ikebana style.
The last but not the least is Japanese traditional art. To enlighten your living space you can borrow Asian wisdom.

The art of making compositions of plants is called ikebana. Ikebana can be made both of fresh and dried flowers, branches, roots. The compositions may be different – high, flat, chaotic … It depends on the style of ikebana.

But regardless of the style, the main thing in a bouquet that is uniqueness – an unexpected, unusual dynamic material form – it gives a bouquet some movement, mood and form.

In the XV century ikebana had a religious character, it was a tribute Gods and symbolized eternity. It consisted of two elements that meant the struggle of dark and light forces. Ikebanas were created only by men, as it required a lot of strength.  Now the art of arranging flowers is a part of compulsory education for women.

The main principals of creating ikebana are the following:

• the harmony of yin and yang
• proportion, color combination
• asymmetry
• the use of three mandatory lines (stems symbolizing heaven, man and earth)
• symbolization
• dynamism and incompleteness
• refined simplicity

Fortunately, you don’t have to spend many years to learn all the rules of this Japanese art. You can simply follow the main rule “both the eyes and the heart of creator should be free” and begin to decorate the space around you!

11. Grow you own bonsai tree
Bonsai is one more Japanese traditional art form of growing a miniature trees in containers. Most people just buy a bonsai tree in an (online) shop and continue to look after it. But you also can pick and buy the right tree species in a special shop and start growing it by yourself. It will be much more exciting and less expensive to grow and style a bonsai tree yourself.