Houseplants are a timeless trend in home design. They’re pleasant to look at, they make your space appear bigger and serve as beautiful decorations. On the other hand, many of them come with stylish modern planters that also serve as gorgeous décor elements. If you want to beautify your indoor space with plants, there’s one of two ways you can go: you can either choose real or artificial flowers. While many people favour live plants for their air purifying properties, artificial plants are more convenient for those with busy lifestyles, small children, or pets.

Should I Buy a Live or an Artificial Plant?

When it comes to purchasing plants for your home, both real and fake plants have certain drawbacks and advantages. Before making your choice, you need to ask yourself a few questions that will help you determine which plant qualities are most important for you and your home:

• How often are you home? If you’re traveling often and there is no one at home to take care of your plants, even those live plants that are the most low-maintenance will be hard to look after. The business of your schedule can help you determine the type of houseplant that’s right for you.
• What is the level of maintenance you are looking for? While certain people enjoy caring about complicated plants, others only want a pretty flower that they can place on their coffee table and forget about for a couple of days.
• Do you have nosey pets and/or small children? Sometimes pets and small kids find plants entertaining and proceed to chew on their leaves. If they ingest parts of the plant, this can lead to many health problems.
• How much room do you have? Think about how much free space you have for your plants. Certain live plants tend to grow fast and eventually become much larger than the day you got them. If you don’t want your plant to take up a lot of space, you might want to get flowers artificial in type. They’re better than no plants!
• Are you planning to move soon? In case you’re staging your home for sale in the near future, a faux plant will be a better choice.

Reasons to Get an Artificial Plant

If you’re going for no maintenance flowers artificial is the right choice for you. While in the past they used to look tacky and unpleasant, modern faux flowers have a stunning natural appearance that makes them unrecognizable from their live counterparts. They’re carefully crafted and contain materials such as fabric, wire and plastic.

Even if your toddler or puppy decides to play with them, they won’t be subjected to any health risks. These plants will essentially last forever and there’s no way in which you can kill them. This means that you will save money in the long run by not having to replace them – unless you’re redesigning your home. The artificial need no maintenance, so they’re perfect if you don’t have the time to take care of a real plant. Here are a few things you won’t have to worry about when buying a faux plant:

• Watering. When you buy artificial flowers, you won’t have to worry about forgetting to water them on a daily basis, or playing the guessing game of how much water to use.
• Pests. These plants don’t attract bugs, so you will rest easy knowing that your living space is pest-free.
• Soil quality. Real plants require a lot of maintenance for their soil, including fertilization and spraying chemicals. On the other hand, artificial plants require no soil maintenance apart from the occasional dusting.
• Placement. When caring for a live plant, you often need to consider where you will place it. Its location needs to receive a decent amount of indirect sunlight during the day. When it comes to faux plants – you can place them anywhere you like in your home. Regardless of the lighting and temperature of the room, they won’t wilt or shrivel up.

Reasons to Get a Live Plant

Even though they can be a pain to keep alive, these plants offer you numerous health benefits. Here are a few ways in which live plants can enhance your health:

• Reduction of stress levels. Studies show that live plants in your home and office can help create a more soothing and comfortable environment.
• Production of therapeutic effects. Working with plants is shown to improve the well-being of people with health conditions such as anxiety, depression, and dementia.
• Improvement of air quality. The most important advantage that live plants have is their ability to cleanse your indoor air. A NASA study from the 1980s showed that the roots and soil of houseplants largely reduce any airborne volatile organic compounds. Additionally, some research confirms that plants cleanse the air from dust and mould, which is great news for those that suffer from allergy problems.

Bottom Line

Both types of flowers artificial and real work as stunning decorations for your home. Contrary to popular belief, modern fake flowers are extremely convincing live flowers that are available in many different forms. In order to make the best choice for your home:

• Go for a durable artificial plant if you don’t want to bother with maintenance.
• Go for a live plant if you’re more concerned about your indoor air quality and don’t mind dedicating a portion of your time to take care of it.