Every room could be improved with a dose of plant life. Our innate craving for a connection to nature (biophilia) means that decorating with actual nature (like plants), or even references to nature makes us happier, and who doesn’t want to be happier?

Our recent ORC Project, The Vintage Diva Glamour Den, was inspired by an elegant secret garden aesthetic and the Diva has taken the garden part of that quite literally of late. She announced just last week that she had decided to become a plant mom (or #plantkween). We didn’t succumb to the pandemic kitten or puppy trend, so I suppose it seemed like the next best thing. Mostly I think she was concerned that I might repossess the faux bamboo palm for staging projects (and she’s not wrong!). And so we scheduled a trip to my wholesale greenhouse.

The diva does nothing without intention and so step one, as every stage actress knows, is to find your light! She defined the lighting available in the various areas of her room and entered all the info into her Planta plant app to select appropriate plants that would be happy in the available conditions. It is a beautiful room, full of lovely details and gorgeous textiles and furniture, but it sits on the northwest corner of the house, so sun-loving plant children like these dessert beauties were out of the question.

Our first foray into the greenhouses we came home with 10 plants. Seven of them are the Diva’s. It’s getting a little crowded in the Diva Den, but it definitely feeds her secret garden/forest nymph style! My seven grand plants were mostly purchased with low light and low maintenance in mind. A few higher maintenance selections snuck in…but they were just a little irresistible. She named them. Of course she did!

We have Dierdre a dracaena corn plant with few requirements, Daphne the dragon palm with just the right size and shape to replace the faux bamboo palm, Pearl a beautiful succulent string of pearls vine, Beatrice a shy and pretty button fern that requires shade {and misting apparently}, Mona the Mona Lisa lipstick plant, Myrtle a topiary myrtle tree that was just too cute to pass up, and Cindy the quirky bromeliad that requires a soak in the tub followed by an air dry more often than I would possibly find amusing. Cindy would be doomed on my watch, but she definitely has a lot of personality!

Not to be left out, I got 3 low maintenance options for the living room: Zsa Zsa the ZZ plant is supposed to tolerate low light and relative neglect, Phil the philodendron is fairly indestructible (I’ve miraculously managed these before for quite extended spells), and Lulu the lipstick plant gets the window with filtered actual sunlight. My track record isn’t great, so we’ll see how long they last. Unlike Jenna, I have not created a plant watering and feeding schedule in an app with reminders. I already have too many reminders as it is.

Apparently, seven was not crowded enough and so another shopping spree ensued. Five more plants including another tree have come to live in the Diva Den. A laurenti snake plant (or mother-in-laws tongue…I can see where those two are interchangeable…) named Lola , a golden pothos named Aurelia, a silver or satin pothos named Sylvia, and an intriguing prayer plant named Phoebe whose leaves fold upward at night.

The rather significant tree is another dracaena corn plant, a mass cane variety named Cornelia. Jamie (the Diva’s brother and master of understatement) summed it up best RE the giant tree with “I have to be honest, she’s kind of a lot…” LOL. Yes, she is!

…and so now I have grand-plants. It’s probably the closest I’m going to get to grandchildren and honestly? they are not as noisy or messy…also probably not as adorable, but shhhh, don’t tell them I said so!