one obsession leads to another...

My new houseplant additction has led to a need for pots. My house is a little on the formal side, so I prefer using something decorative. What are your favorite sources for pots? So far, mine is New England Bonsai Gardens. Many of their containers are suitable for standard houseplants. They are clay with colored glazes and have nice large drain holes. I have also had a little luck in consignment and antique centers. I would love to hear what you guys have come up with.

Another need that has arisen, is some sort of shelving system for my southern facing windows. I only have three in my house, so I want to maximise their space. Traditional, multi-tiered plant stands don't come up high enough for a traditional window, so I was thinking of putting up some glass shelves. Any ideas on that? I would prefer not to screw into the window frame at each level, so the best system would be a single unit that has multiple shelves.

thanks,
Donna

Hee hee .... My house is FAR from being on the formal side, but I like using decorative pots too. I like buying ceramic or clay or terra cotta .... any that don't have drainage holes .... I use them as sorta cache pots to hole the ugly plastic ones and they keep water from going all over when I water the plants! I tried the saucer's underneath years ago ... did not work for me, I always ended up with water spilling out of the saucers. I even put small plants in decorative pitchers.

I buy a pot whenever I see something that catches my eye, be it at a department store, thrift store, antique shop .... even yard sales!

Another idea that looks nice is to set your plastic pots inside baskets. I buy the plastic water trays (Wal Mart has them) to set under the pot. Baskets give a real nice look for plants that grow upright where the basket will show.

Yep .... I've done that with baskets before too. I only have one plant in a basket right now. If I can't find the plastic water trays, I will use the zip lok plastic containers inside baskets too! They come in round, square and rectangular shapes and work well with different shaped baskets!

We are lucky, ours is a farm house. "Come as you are!"
I actually built this window for plants.

Bernie

This dining room window.

Bernie: What a wonderful space .... for plants and I'm sure for people too! Oh how nice it must be living in the country!

Thanks for the input, all. Bernie, I am jealous of all that plant space. It's such a challenge for me to find the appropriate exposure for all the plants that I want. No suggestions for shelving over windows?

Donna, I have exactly same problem as you. New addiction to cacti&succulent plants plus couple dozen of other houseplants, and only three sunny windows. Except one of the windows is in my son bedroom, and he won't have any of my plants there. I got most of my pots at Michael's, but they are not very "formal". I've also found very good small pots at www.bonsaimonk.com . Check them out, they have good selection of Japanese pots, if you need small (3-5in) or shallow pots. I was looking for some kind of window shelves too, but didn't find anything yet. My best idea so far, is to put up a rod in the window (like a curtain rod), and hang some pots or may be shelves from it. My DH won't let me make many holes in window frames :(
Hope that somebody here will have better solution.

Thanks, Bagel! Thats a nice website. Their pots are very similar to what I get at New England Bonsai. The curtain rod idea is interesting. I would like to have one system of about 3 or 4 shelves to hang from a rod or just screw it in at the top of the window. What's that saying..."Necessity is the mother of invention"? Let me know if you come up with anything and I will do the same for you.

Donna

Hi Bagle, I just found something that looks like it could work. Go to Howstuffworks.com and look up How to make plant shelves for a window. I have to let my husband look over the plan..luckily he's a carpenter...but it looks like it could work nicely without putting a lot of holes in the window. Let me know what you think.

Donna

Oh my! I think I just found the perfect solution...go to: Indoorwindowgardening.com

D

Hi Donna, thank you for the links! I'll check them out. Another idea was to buy shelves with plant lights in them. These can be put anywhere, like in a dark bedroom, for example. I have to surrender my laptop to my son now. He has some homework to do, and cannot use his.
B.

Donna, it looks almost exactly as what I had in mind!!! I hope it is well made too. May be somebody in this forum had some experience with this place: www.indoorwindowgardening.com . Too bad there is no comments about it in GW http://davesgarden.com/products/gwd/c/2345/ yet.
Thank you so much for sharing. Boy, I am glad I found this tread! Now I have an excuse to buy more plants ;-) Hmmm, may be join coop in C&S?

Hi Bagel, Their location is about an hour and a half from my house, so I plan to go up there if they allow customers to visit. I will call them today if I have time. I just want to see one up close so I can get a better idea of how it attaches and to see what the quality is. I will let everyone know what the outcome is.

D

PS. What is this coop?

Donna, here is co-op: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/774704/ it is still open, I guess.

Please, let us know what you find about these window shelves. If this company is so close to you, may be they sell their product in some local stores close to you? I tried to find their rating or reviews on internet, but no luck so far, they must be new.

Thanks, Bagel. I will keep you posted on the shelves.