How to Decorate for the Holidays with Live Plants

December 7, 2018 by Craig Urbine Leave a Comment

Keeping it “Real”

The Holidays are here. It’s time to decorate and celebrate with family, friends and co-workers.

Every year we “deck the halls” in mostly traditional ways. But have you ever noticed some subtle differences when live plants and trees in fiberglass planters are used to accessorize your decor?

The Tree

Every year, Holiday trees are bought, used for a few weeks, then they land in the recycle shredding machine. During its short visit in your home or office, your tree requires constant care to maintain color. And, oh, those dropped and dying needles! That’s not even considering the purchase price and set up, and dragging it out at the end of the every season.

This year, try a live Fraser Fir in a Wannsee extra large planter. Enjoy the fresh smell and look of a live tree with sturdy limbs capable of supporting heavy ornaments. The charm of the majestic Fraser Fir will add refinement to your individuality. At the end of the Holiday Season, simply remove the decorations and place this beautiful tree at an entry way for your enjoyment all year ’round. The fiberglass planters are designed to stay pristine in all weather conditions. Next year, begin pruning your tree by reshaping the branches. Be careful not to trim too much – you don’t want holes in your tree. Now you can be ready for another festive season. The Fraser Fir delivers all of that – without cutting down a tree every year.

The Holiday Party

The tree is decorated, guests are invited, menu is set and now it’s time to decorate.

Perhaps it’s time to think “inside the box.” White Poinsettias placed in bright red square or rectangular fiberglass planters will add style to any decor. A high gloss finish will reflect the holiday lights – and your unique style. Placing several around your party area will provide for festive and eye-popping glamour. With some care, Poinsettias too can be kept year round for your next Holiday Season.

Another great plant to add to your Holiday Season is the Winterberry Holly Tree. A fast-growing tree that is hardy in almost any environment produces a bright red berry on a bare limb! There’s no greenery to distract from the red color. Place this tree in a tall round white planter for a stunning focal point. This tree can be placed outside in temperatures as low as -30 degrees. Never fear that the planters will freeze and break, or become brittle like terracotta. It’s fiberglass – strong and resilient! The planter will certainly stand up to the challenge and protect the roots of your tree and provide pristine beauty all year long.

Amaryllis. The Amaryllis flower blooms at different times of the year. It’s important to pick the right Amaryllis if you want blooms from November to December. Three or more placed in the Reade rectangular planter in colors to compliment your blooms will provide more beauty to your overall decorum.

Adding fiberglass planters and live plants to your Holiday traditions will bring elegance and depth to your holiday decor in your home or office for years to come. After all, wouldn’t you rather be celebrating?

From all of us at Planters Etc, Happy Holidays!

Unique Ways Homeowners Use Their Planters

November 5, 2018 by Craig Urbine Leave a Comment

Planters can help extend our inside space into the outdoors by adding beauty and functionality to decks and porches as well as adding curb appeal to the front and sides of your home. Offering many designs, colors and style, every home can be upgraded with flowers and greenery.

Added Curb Appeal

Did you ever drive by a home and just feel welcomed? Perhap you didn’t realize that part of the great appeal is the warm inviting look of their planters. Outside curb appeal adds so much to the look of your home. Planters, like that of our Niagara design can blend into the home or be a major focal point in the yard. When staging your home to sell, this unique way of changing the outside look of your home can add dollars to your sales price. The planters themselves can be a negotiating item in any sale offers.

Room Dividers

Another way planters can be used is as room dividers in large spaces. Separating spaces into different areas for specific purposes can take advantage of unused and wasted space. Creating a sitting room or foyer with plants will add dimension and style. Since planters are mobile, they can easily be moved when the larger space is needed for family gatherings and parties in the home. This unique feature allows you to be creative with your design.

Planters Add Acoustic Quality

Today’s busy homeowners believe that “less is more”. However, less furniture and less places for your eyes to “rest”, means the potential is greater for echoes and noises that can make a home environment stressful and tiring. By their sheer existence in a room, planters with plants can help absorb noise. Not wanting to add more work to busy lives, plants requiring little attention would work to serve several purposes while adding beauty and grace to any home.

Line Your Driveway

Planters on either (or both) sides of your driveway will add color and allow your unique style to show. Seasonal flowers, or year-round slow-growing trees such as Pine, Juniper, Japanese Maple, and Olive do very well in rectangular containers such as the Narbonne Rectangular Planter Box. Check your Planting “Zone” so that you know what grows best. Keep in mind when lining your driveway of your family’s driving skills! While Planters are strong and durable, they do have limits and so do most automobiles!

Beautify That Privacy Fence

We love our privacy! In areas where houses are close together, a privacy fence is a must. But it doesn’t have to be unattractive. Planters along the fence will dress up that yard with color and define your particular style. Taller trees surrounded by low ground cover plants, or medium shrubs with grass in the planters like the Tiergarden Rectangular Rail Planter will add new life to an old fence. If no privacy fence exists, why not make one with planters! Consider putting a vegetable garden in the planters for your family to enjoy. Teaching children the joys and rewards of gardening will create memories for a lifetime.

So many options await for your unique taste to be displayed. Design your home with planters, both inside and out, and enjoy the wonderful things that plants add to our lives.

Balcony Vegetable Gardening – Fiberglass Planters to Replace the Backyard

October 15, 2018 by Craig Urbine Leave a Comment

Limited space does not mean limited choices. Quite the contrary, small apartment balconies or large decks in your yard offer a unique opportunity for an outside living space with charm, and rype and ready vegetables for your table. Fresh vegetables grown in an environment that you control will be rewarding, delicious and fun for the whole family. Monitoring the pesticides and nutrients will provide for a healthy alternative to the vegetables found at the supermarket. An added bonus will be teaching your children the wonderful art of gardening that will bring them memories and skills that last a lifetime.

Define Your style

Before you begin, define your style. Fiberglass planters offer many choices. Shorter planters provide easy access for children; taller planters can eliminate bending. Coming in a variety of sizes, shapes, colors and textures, you can mix and match to create an eclectic space or coordinate them in your favorite colors. Lightweight and easy to install, fiberglass containers offer flexibility in designing your outside space, and they beautify any area with style that is uniquely your own.

Choosing the Right Planter for the Job

Once you have decided on the style, make sure you know the needs of the vegetables you will be growing. Different vegetables will require different soil types and different drainage requirements. Some require no drainage while others require the soil to be soaked then dried to a damp state. Planters come with or without drain holes allowing water to nourish and drain your plants adequately. The right amount of water will produce the results you desire.

Placement of Planters

Placement of your vegetable garden planters will also be important to be productive and fruitful. For example, root vegetables such as beet and carrots do well in partial shade (direct sun for only a few hours a day); leafy vegetables such as spinach and salad greens thrive well in full shade (no direct sun).

There are many types and varieties of vegetables that love full sun. Full sun is considered to be 6-8 hours per day of direct sunlight. Some examples of easy-to-grow and healthy full sun vegetables are tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and beans. Tomatoes and peppers require less space, while cucumbers and beans need room to spread out and make vines to support a larger crop.

Planting Seasons

Some vegetables thrive in colder temps while others need the hot summer sun to produce. Your geographic zone will help you determine what grows best in your climate. With fiberglass planters, however, you can “rotate your crops” from season to season and enjoy fresh vegetables of your choice all year long.

Armed with information about conditions, sturdy and durable fiberglass planters allow you to control the growing process from the comfort of your own home and enjoy quality fresh vegetables for years and years to come. Happy Growing!

How Having Office Plants Affect Your Home Business

September 17, 2018 by Craig Urbine Leave a Comment

Working from home may sound like the perfect way to keep your stress level low and your job satisfaction high, but many people feel that their home office is actually lacking some of the things that drive productivity. One of those items is office plants, which are often strategically placed in office spaces to help boost productivity and help employees feel more at ease in their space. Here are a few reasons you should be adding office plants to your home business right away:

Creating a Dedicated Working Space

Perhaps the biggest challenge of running a home business is staying on track while you are home. By creating a dedicated office space, you can keep yourself on track and ensure that you do not lose productivity to other household distractions. Office plants can help absorb sound and light, creating a barrier between your home office and the rest of the house. Plus, when you are surrounded by living office plants, you won’t feel the need to go outside for long breaks as much as the outdoors have been brought in.

Plants Improve Air Quality

If you didn’t already know, there is significant research showing that our home indoor air quality tends to be worse than the outside air. This is because we keep our home businesses mostly closed up without fresh air coming in. If you want to make a positive impression on your clients or guests, adding indoor planters can really help improve the air quality inside and create a fresher smell throughout the home. Plus, it’s good for you and your family as well! You can even cut down on the number of illnesses experienced by your household.

Managing Stress

Stress management is an important part of keeping a home business alive. Since you are effectively living and working in the same space, it can be hard to shut your mind down at the end of the workday and manage that work-life balance. Indoor planters can boost your mood and lighten the ambiance of your home business so that you feel relaxed while you are there. In addition, they provide excellent focal points if you decide you need a break to meditate or just think. You can’t get a better source of mental health than this!

Plants Are Inspiring Creativity

Surrounding yourself with natural colors and shapes in the form of office planters is a good way to inspire yourself daily. Whether you are an artist or an accountant, plants hold an inherent beauty that activates creative regions of your brain, allowing you to think outside the box and find new solutions to old problems. The more varied your planters are, the more you will benefit from this wealth of inspiration. You can even dedicate some time to arranging and planting new plants from time to time so that you can exercise your creativity in a new and exciting way.

Office planters are a small investment with a multitude of positive payoffs. When you place indoor planters throughout your home business, you will transform your space into a living, breathing workplace where you get things done and reach new goals. Do away with the dusty, bland office shelves and bring in some color and fresh scented flowers to dress things up. Then sit back and admire your handywork as you mull over those spreadsheets. You’ll find that you and your clients are more comfortable in a space that has been filled with greenery and beautiful planters that add warmth. For more information, visit Planters ETC today and see our full collection of indoor planters, large and small! We are happy to help you find the perfect fit for your home business.

How to Turn Your Planter Into An Indoor Succulent Garden

August 9, 2018 by Craig Urbine Leave a Comment

Planting an indoor succulent garden can really help to liven up your home or office space. Succulents are very desirable because of their unique look, low maintenance, and non-allergenic qualities. They also come in a wide range of sizes and colors to accommodate any room.

If you are ready to transform your fiberglass planter into a lush succulent garden, here’s what you need to do:

Gather Your Supplies

First, you need a fiberglass planter with a large opening on top. Succulents are very versatile so you don’t necessarily need a very deep planter, but you can use a shallow planter with a broad opening like our Selenge. Once you’ve selected a planter you will need soil for your plants. In most cases, you can buy cactus potting soil pre-mixed from a store. Cactus and succulent soil is different from other soil types because it is meant to drain well and does not hold as much moisture. If you cannot find cactus soil, you can buy regular potting soil and add some sand to the mix. This ensures that the soil is porous and closely matches the natural growing environment of the plants you choose. Finally, you will need gravel to put at the bottom of your planter. The layer of gravel will also assist with drainage, and gives the succulents somewhere dry to put their roots.

You will probably want to have a pair of gloves handy as well. Many succulents have spines or thorns that you will have to navigate around as you do your planting.

Choose Your Plants

As we mentioned above, succulents come in many varieties. To create a really organic look in your planter, you will want to buy a range of colors and sizes that you can mix and match. Make sure to pick out one or two large succulents to serve as the focal point of your display, and then smaller varieties to give your planter some depth and texture.

Put Your Design Together

Start assembling your indoor succulent garden by placing the layer of gravel in the planter first. Then fill the planter most of the way to the top with your cactus ready soil. Gently remove your largest succulent from its pot and position it in your planter where you want it. Some people choose to place their largest plants in the very center and work outward in rounds, but if you have a long straight-edged planter, you may want to place the largest plants in the back and work forward in half-circles.

A special note about succulents: succulents naturally grow in little clusters. They don’t typically compete for resources because they require so little in the way of water. Thus, when you are planning your design, try to create clusters of your own. You don’t have to space the plants out like you would with flowers or other plants, which would look quite unnatural in a succulent garden. Just make sure that all the roots are sufficiently covered, and you should be okay to plant your succulents in colorful groups however you like.

That’s really all it takes to build a beautiful indoor succulent garden in a fiberglass planter. Planters are perfect for creating succulent gardens because these plants require little maintenance and won’t get cramped living in a planter as time goes on. With a properly planted succulent garden, you can enjoy a beautiful green view year round!

For more information about fiberglass planters for succulents, click here to look at our full collection of colorful fiberglass indoor planter options. We can help you plan the perfect indoor succulent display in any size or shape to fit your home or commercial space.