What plants work best for your conservatory

On a trip down to the south west of England, we took ourselves along to the Eden Project in Cornwall. We’re into conservatories and sun rooms in a big way, and there’s none quite to big as Eden’s huge bio-domes full of plants, trees and all kinds of beautiful things.

Of course, that got us thinking about the best way to plant for your own conservatories.

These days, the conservatory has transformed itself from the bland addition to a house filled with a few cane chairs and a forlorn-looking spider plant, and is now very much a part of the modern home, being used as a kitchen, a dining room, a family room and many other uses.

We design and build orangeries as well, and if we’ve learned anything from history it’s that extremely rich people had them as part of their country homes to show off their exotic plant collections. There’s no need to be quite so exotic as our Victorian ancestors, so what can you pick up at your local garden centre that does well in your sun room?

It all depends how you’re going to heat your conservatory. If you want your sun room to go down the route of being warm and dry, then you might as well go the whole hog and go for palms that like that sort of thing. Also suited for the dry and hot atmosphere are olives, and you might want to try your luck at reaping some sort of harvest. Bougainvilleas – a proper tropical plant in itself – makes an excellent climber inside a conservatory, and would look superb on any drab back wall that needs sprucing up.

If you’re into flowering plants that prefer a slightly cooler and humid atmosphere, you might want to consider winter flowers like azalea, polyanthus and cyclamen that do really well with the minimum of heating.Watch movie online The Transporter Refueled (2015)

Everything depends on your lifestyle. The old standards of rubber plants and yucca always do well with the minimum of attention, so if you want the look without the effort, you might want to give a home to a couple of these.

One warning though: Many people make the mistake of buying a plant or tree that grows out of control and takes over the conservatory. Great if you want your own indoor jungle, not so great if you want to use it every day as a family room. Most garden centres will be able to advise, and even have speciality displays.