Artificial plants - why? Stop

[nostaples]

I don't get why anyone would buy an artificial plant yet there are suddenly lots of them (heading for landfill). If you really don't think you can cope with watering a plant, get a cactus or no plant.

I once went into a shop that specialised in fake flowers and foliage. Their Instagram page looked amazing, a shop crammed with very on-trend, blush-pink hydrangeas, peonies, flower garlands... But stepping into the shop, it just smelt like plastic and petro chemicals. Like the smell when you tear off a new bin liner. I think my subconscious was expecting that lovely fresh florists smell so it felt really jarring!

Each to their own.

I have them because I'm crap at maintaining living plants. I killed a succulent within weeks (over watering)

My real lawn is full of mosquitos. My neighbours fake lawn is not. Not sure why you’d need it in the UK tho.

I have good fake plants in my conservatory. It gets too cold and too hot in there for real plants.

There is no way I’d have an artificial lawn though.

Fake grass is ridiculous. Looks shit, provides no benefit for wildlife, looks shit, needs hoovering and it looks shit. I can't believe people who say it looks good.

Fake plants I just don't understand. If you want a plant in your house, get one. Why do you want fake plastic plants? Surely they don't give off the same MH benefits as real plants because you know they are fake.

Good fake plant looks a lot better than a sad real plant. Also lots of spaces have zero natural light - particularly bathrooms in flats etc, so no plant would ever thrive in there?

Swan they can be useful because we get so much rain - if you have a football addicted child, a lovely lawn quickly turns into a mud bath unfortunately.

Surely they don't give off the same MH benefits as real plants because you know they are fake

What mental health benefits do you get from house plants ? Particularly if they keep dying?

er, purification of the air. Using them to make tea etc

And you can't feel that lovely earthly ground feel with fake grass.

Any fake plants I have get covered in cobwebs very quickly, and fake grass won't have daisies and buttercups growing.

I got fake plants/flowers for the balcony border because I managed to kill everything else/they were devoured by slugs and snails. I did throw them away but that's because they died too, and the slugs and snails still ate them.

I gave up now.

I buy second hand artificial flowers, is that allowed?

I would have said exactly the same as you a few years ago. No more, the good ones and they are not cheap are amazing. I have an aracena in my bedroom that otherwise would not do very well.

On my balcony which is shaded and windy, I have a couple of fake palms mixed in with real plants and they look amazing. It's all about the detail, they've got fake brown bits and little veins in the leaves and everything x

Ah good, most people agree. You're so right about artificial grass too.

If you can't keep a plant, just don't get why you would want a lump of shaped plastic in your house. It will end up in landfill one way or another so it's bad for the environment whereas real plants are actively good for it.

Link to top ten plants for air purification www.perrywood.co.uk/gardening-tips/top-ten-house-plants-that-literally-clean-the-air/

DMil changed her living plants for artificial ones when she could no longer care for them.
She was housebound, too, so no going to the park and her windows looked out towards a school yard.

I can’t stand fake grass. No wonder our wildlife is stuggling!

*struggling

I want to add fake flowers to the hit list. Dust collectors and I can spot a fake a mile away

Please tell me I can LTB as he's insisted on fake grass aarrghhh I hate it 😩😩😩 but I do love my bathroom fake plant 😂 stops the cat messing about with it!

Ah good, most people agree.

I don’t think they did, 🤣

Fake plants are pretty naff but not as awful as fake grass, that's just vile! Surely fake plants get dusty??? You don't need to dust real plants.

@1940s , fake grass is permission to LTB!

They're a bit 'Nandos' - I have lots of real plants in my house and they are hard work but dusting plazzy plants, nope.

But you have to dust real plants!

Surely fake plants get dusty??? You don't need to dust real plants.
Course you do, both real and fake get equally dusty. You can hoover the fake ones but the real ones don't like it.

I am a bad gardener then as i do not dust my (real) plants. I very much wish one of my (real) cacti would die as it looks more and more obscenely phallic every day.