Terrariums are a gardening trend that bring small yet perfectly formed botanical worlds into the home.
The idea is to create a self-sustainable environment in a vessel which can feed the plants that live within it. They come in two forms, the open terrarium and the closed terrarium.
The closed terrarium lives in a lidded container and creates a completely functional ecosystem. The enclosed space allows condensation to form on the walls and water the plants.
The open terrarium is not enclosed but still has an effective irrigation system. They need to be watered independently.
Terrariums are great for indoor and outdoor living decorations and, if you plant the right greenery, can help to detoxify the air in your home.
We spoke to the Botanical Boys and asked them to share their top tips on how to create an open living terrarium…
YOU'LL NEED:
- A glass vessel with an opening of 18cm or more to easily fit your hand in and arrange your plants.
- A terrarium tool kit. You can order them from here for Amazon for £4.09 each. Alternatively, any small enough tools you already have in the shed will also work.
- Layer1: Two to three small cups of washed gravel or small pebble stones for your first base layer. This acts as drainage.
- Layer 2: A thin layer of Sphagnum moss (to aide drainage and filtration) place this on top of the pebble layer.
- Layer 3: A small handful of horticultural charcoal (to spread on top of the sphagnum moss layer).
- Layer 4: Three small cups of potting soil (to a depth of about three inches in the vessel).
- A selection of plants. We recommend fittonia (nerve plants), variegated spider ferns, aquamarine plant, creeping fig, rabits foot ferns and birds nest ferns.
- A selection of moss. Bun moss is brilliant for creating mini hills in your terrarium and sheet moss is good for flat planes or hillsides.
- Additional decorations of your choice – coloured sand, pebbles, figurines etc.
METHOD:
1. Create your layers
Put each layer neatly into your vessel in the order seen above.
2. Think of a design for your terrarium:
- Do you want the landscape to be flat or irregular? You can create 'hills' using a build up of soil and moss.
- What do you want your main focal point to be?
- What plants will you use? You should aim for no more than two types of plant for your design, as not to distract the eye from the rest of your landscape, even just one plant can stand out beautifully in a terrarium. However, there are no set rules, so get creative.
- Do you want to add any other decorative elements? Perhaps create a stream using blue sand or add miniature house figurines to create a hamlet.
3. Planting
Start getting creative and building your mini garden. When planting, remove the small plant from its pot and gently remove some excess soil from its roots. Use a pointer tool or your fingers to create a small hole in your soil and place the plant into it.
Tip! Always place your plants into the soil before adding the rest of your landscape such as moss or rocks. It is easier to plan around the plants than dig holes through your moss or disturb your stones.
Note that many of these plants will eventually outgrow their environment and need to be repotted.
4. Create your landscape
Loosely break up the moss with your fingers to fit the design you want to achieve and place on top of the soil or rocks you want covered.
TIP! Some mosses do not always require soil as a base, they can be placed on top of rocks, logs etc. as long they are kept moist.
5. Add decoration
- For pathways and rivers, use your fingers to create a shallow trench line in the soil and fill it with either pebbles, sand or stones.
- For mountains and cliff sides, a number of different rock types can be used, including beach pebbles, black polished river stones, aquarium rocks and so on... be creative!
- Add animals and people. Miniature railway models are perfect for terrariums to create a sense of reality and give it some real life character. You can use sheep for grazing the hillsides, people sitting on benches next to the river bed, the list of ideas are endless...
TIP! Try to restrain from adding too many extras in your terrarium as it will detract from the beauty of the landscape. For securing your objects, craft glue is the perfect solution to stop them falling over. However glue is not needed for objects being placed in the moss or soil bedding.
HOW TO CARE FOR YOUR TERRARIUM
Once you have completed your open terrarium, it will need regular watering to keep the plants and moss moist. For moss terrariums, they need a light water once a week. For plant-heavy terrariums, they need to be watered twice a week. Use a spray gun or a terrarium water bottle that has a pointy nozzle to help guide the water.
Make sure your terrarium is not in direct sunlight to avoid the plants over heating and drying out.
TIP! If your environment is particularly dry, water them three times per week as necessary to the touch of the soil. In summer, a little more water maybe required.
We managed to create this open terrarium in just half an hour (the post box was a must!). It now sits proudly on a desk at Country Living HQ...
The Botanical Boys host a horticultural tour of London through Airbnb. Find out more about the Two Green Thumbs experience here.
