FUN WITH FOLIAGE
It’s official: green is the new orange. An adorable cactus at your favourite brunch spot, a string of pearls spilling over a shelf, flora crowding apartment balconies… Australia is obsessed with plants.
Likely linked to our growing fascination with wellbeing and earth-friendly lifestyles, plants can help improve mental health and bring a splash of nature into what can sometimes feel like a concrete jungle.
“With social media allowing easier visual communication, we’ve all contributed to inspiring others to garden,” says Jason Chongue, architect and author of plant-care guide Plant Society. “Something that seemed difficult is now achievable to our wider community.”
For millennials, owning a family home can seem like a fantasy, but owning a plant offers a way of taking responsibility for a living thing at the same time as wresting control of a living space. According to the , 38 per cent of Australians have bought a small tropical plant (like a peace lily) in the past year, while 18 per cent have bought a trailing plant and one in four have bought a native plant. One in four are motivated by mindfulness — many architects
