How to Decorate a Winter Garden with Plants (7 Ideas)

Sunrooms (or Florida rooms) are specially constructed to let in the maximum amount of sun and are inhabitable glass boxes filled with creature comforts. Plants can add a greater sense of coziness to your winter garden, but like any room in your home, you undoubtedly want it decorated well. But how do you decorate a winter garden with plants?

Here are 7 ideas for how you can decorate a winter garden with plants:

1. Coordinate your plants.
2. Use plants as accessories.
3. Consider planters and pots carefully.
4. Get creative with foliage decor.
5. Get creative with foliage decor.
7. Consider what type of winter garden you have.
8. Know which plants can thrive in your winter garden’s environment.
9. Take into account the style of your winter garden.

Your Florida room is as much a part of your home as any other room there, so it’s important to consider your decorating options. In the rest of this article, I’ll go over some fantastic options for decorating your winter garden.

1. Coordinate Your Plants

Not all shades of green match, and they also don’t always go well with different colors. For example, you probably wouldn’t try to pair lime green and navy green together, even though both are variations of the same color.

The same goes for your decor and the foliage you choose. If you have dark green cushions, either stick to that exact shade of foliage (if possible) or go with one that complements it.

You should also have a keen eye when deciding what flowering plants you want. The flowers essentially serve as ornaments and should harmonize with the surrounding decor as such.

Let’s say you have white furniture or accents. Pink flowers will work wonderfully. Red flowers with turquoise, on the other hand, might not look as great.

2. Use Plants as Accessories

The beauty of using plants for decorating is that you can place them anywhere. As such, they make beautiful accessories.

If your sunroom has a bookshelf, you can tuck a few flowers into your literary collection. You can spruce up your windowsills with succulents and place some palms in pots in the corners of the room.

Plants also make fantastic centerpieces. A simple vase with a couple of flowers or a particularly decorative container can work wonders for a table.

Hanging plants from the ceiling is a fairly easy way to add some flair to the space and draw attention to a different level of interest.

3. Consider Planters and Pots Carefully

Here’s a scenario: You buy pots and discover an adorable little windmill-shaped one—but the only problem is that you want it for your Hawaiian-themed winter garden. Here’s a general rule of thumb: Stick to planters and pots that your plants can grow in and that match your decor.

As much as you may want that windmill-shaped pot, it probably won’t go well with your Hawaiian-themed winter garden. But you can still use it for your bedroom if you want.

For the same reason, ceramic planters and pots go wonderfully with more traditional, rustic winter gardens. Hanging planters or those with colorful geometric patterns work well for Mediterranean-themed winter gardens.

4. Get Creative with Foliage Decor

The problem with using live plants as decor is that they’re living organisms that require care. Taking care of plants can be a challenging task if you don’t have a green thumb. For those of you who struggle with plants, there’s another way to incorporate plant-themed decor instead!

I’m not saying you shouldn’t use any live plants at all, but if a bunch of leaves isn’t appealing to you, maybe try leaf-printed chair cushions instead. You can make up for the lack of real plants with tropical accents and knick-knacks. All of this, combined with a few strategically placed plants (and foliage outdoors), can work wonders for your winter garden.

5. Consider What Type of Winter Garden You Have

Winter gardens or sunrooms are rooms with walls made predominantly of windows and are accessible from the interior of the house. Usually, there is no connection between a winter garden and the central air and heating systems of a home.

There is more than one variation of a winter garden. All of them are designed to let natural light into your home. However, traditional winter gardens, three-season rooms, and four-season rooms have fundamental differences from one another.

• Three-season rooms. Three-season rooms have many windows and can also be entered from inside the home. The only difference is that they’re built for the majority of the year except for severe winters.
• Four-season rooms. A four-season room is a sunroom that is connected to a home’s heating and cooling systems, allowing homeowners to use them all year round.
• Screened room or porch. Screened rooms and porches replace glass with wire mesh walls. While screened rooms provide ample fresh air, it also means that you can’t use your screened porch in certain weather conditions.

All of these sunrooms have their pros and cons. For example, traditional winter gardens are only effective and inhabitable during sunny, warm weather. Meanwhile, screened porches are not very useful in cold, snowy, or incredibly wet weather.

Three-season rooms give you more options in terms of plant diversity, but if you live where the winters are harsh, it would be in your best interest to choose hardy, year-round foliage.

If you have a four-season winter garden, you’re fortunate to have many options to choose from as well. You can go for anything from ordinary houseplants to sun-loving succulents whenever you want.

6. Know Which Plants Can Thrive in Your Winter Garden’s Environment

Not all plants can handle every environment. Some plants thrive better in hot climates, while others prefer more humid temperatures.

Understanding how to balance these two elements is an essential part of selecting plants for your winter garden. Sunlight and temperatures decrease significantly during the colder seasons, so it’s important to take these changes into consideration when making your choices.

Three-season and four-season winter gardens can accommodate a greater variety of plant species since they have temperature control options. Suppose you have a type of flower that grows best in warmer temperatures: a four-season room can be temperature-regulated, whereas a typical winter garden cannot.

7. Take Into Account the Style of Your Winter Garden

Just because you can fill your winter garden with a sea of green doesn’t mean you should.

An abundance of plants won’t work with every sunroom decorating scheme. On the other hand, a jungle of potted plants wouldn’t look too out of place with a tropical theme, but it might not go so well with a country-style sunroom.

Having too many plants may end up distracting from the view of the decor. Too much focus is on the foliage, and the effort you put into the design can get lost amid the plant life. It’s also advisable that the color schemes of any flowering plants match the color scheme of the room.

Your plants should also not clash with your design choices. If, for example, you’ve chosen a contemporary design, you don’t need a lot of plants.

Modern spaces often feature open and asymmetrical floor plans combined with bold shapes. Too much foliage can result in a disruptive design.

Conclusion

There are many ways to decorate a winter garden with plants. However, it’s more complicated than just “shoveling in hundreds of succulents and palms everywhere.” You need to have a keen eye for what looks good. When decorating a winter garden with plants:

• Consider your winter garden and what type of plants can thrive there.
• Determine if a certain number or type of plants is suitable for your decor.
• Match your plants to the theme of your winter garden.
• Choose planters and pots that complement your winter garden.
• Use plants as accent pieces.
• If plants aren’t your thing, compensate with plant-themed decor instead.