The best location for plants is a garden room or solarium. These rooms offer the most light in the whole house. If you use it as a green living room and heat it in the winter, you can grow all warmth-loving plants. If you don’t heat it, you can use it as a nice frost-free glass shelter for Mediterranean species. It would also be a perfect place to overwinter plants.

If you have a balcony or patio, it’s also a wonderful place to put your plants during nice weather. They will get natural light throughout the day and normal cool down temperatures at night. When winter comes, you can bring them in and line them up against the patio door.

Plants for Garden Rooms & Patios

Patios sheltered at the side and roofed balconies are a good place for wind-sensitive plants. These include:

 

• Strawberry tree (Arbutus unedo)
• Flowering maple (Abutilon)
• Dutchman’s pipe (Aristolochia macrophylla)
• Begonia
• Bougainvillea
• Campanula
• Trumpet vine (Campsis radicans)
• Blue mist shrub (Caryopteris x clandonensis)
• Cigar plant (Cuphea ignea)
• Dahlia
• Datura
• False banana (Ensete ventricosum)
• Fuchsia
• Heliotrope (Hellotropium arborescens)
• Hibiscus
• Crepe myrtle (Lagerstroemia indica)
• Sweet pea (Lathyrus odoratus)
• Plumbago
• Scarlet sage (Salvia splendens)

In south-, east- or west-facing windows, and in garden rooms, you end up with a lot of sunlight throughout the day. Some of the best plants for this situation would be:

• Aeonium
• Agave
• Tiger aloe (Aloe variegata)
• Rat’s tail cactus (Aporocactus flageliformis)
• Star cactus (Astrophytum)
• Ponytail palm (Beaucarnea)
• Crimson bottlebrush (Callistemon citrinus)
• Old man cactus (Cephalocereus senilis)
• Fan palm (Chamaerops)
• Cabbage tree (Livistona australis)
• Cycads
• Echeveria
• Eucalyptus
• Oleander (Nerium oleander)
• Phoenix palm
• Bird of paradise (Strelitzia)

Plants from the virgin forests of the tropics and subtropics enjoy partly shady, warm and humid locations. This type of atmosphere reminds them of the rainforests. Plants that enjoy this atmosphere include:

• Chinese evergreen (Aglaonema)
• Alocasia
• Anthurium
• Bird’s nest fern (Asplenium nidus)
• Miltonia orchid
• Hart’s tongue fern (Asplenium scolopendrium)
• Mistletoe cactus (Rhipsalis)
• Bulrush (Scirpus)
• Streptocarpus