Plants for Small Apartments: Houseplant Home Tour with Plant Kween — Ep 127

um over here I have my pride and joy I'm gonna bring her out because she needs a little bit of the spotlight Christopher Griffin who goes by the name of plant Queen on Instagram open up his doors to show us what he's growing in his one-bedroom apartment in New York City [Music] welcome oh my god is so good to see you really nice yes this is my humble abode I'm where I keep all my plans and I also happen to live here as well well except that's not such a humble place I know I might actually just repotted I'm this Queen this morning oh you did okay in preparation for the tea I did I'm so yeah picked up that Queen and she is actually the tallest plant that I have right now I actually was just in Chinatown and I saw one just like her you did yeah and and I couldn't believe like how affordable the larger sink sneaked plants are in Chinatown Chinatown the prices are very affordable and they gave me a little discount though cuz I'm a frequent Queen you know so yeah they gave me a little discount and getting her home was a bit of a trek so this is my kitchen up here I have my very first plant oh that I bought about I would say four years ago so you're a little marble Queen yeah the pothos is one of the easiest plants to take care and so she has grown significantly and so she's my pride and joy one of my favorites have you found that she's kept her variegation as well through her growth over the Warriors I'm she's a little greener on this side you can tell like it's variegated on this side and not very dated on this side yeah that is hers okay yeah so that was one of the reasons that I decided to pick this particular plant she was different she was unique and she needed a lot of TLC and so I had to prove to myself that I could take care of plant and she started growing and thriving and now four years later and 89 plants later we are here today how did your plan valve actually start it actually started with my grandmother and my mother my grandmother was the first green goddess in my life we took trips to nurseries when I was a kid and she was just such a presence in the nurseries like both knew who she was which was absolutely amazing and then she passed it on to my mother my mother loves flowers love floral and so I moved into an apartment about four years ago and it was very sterile very white high ceilings sky light nothing I want to do something with this like what can we do I had two roommates at the time I think you know what I'm gonna buy a plant I'm gonna honor my grandmother and my mother and I'm gonna get a plant and so started off with this one plant and it just grew into this fascination and curiosity that had to be fed and yeah now four years later it's grown into this amazing thing where I've come to build community through plants which has been absolutely amazing and also just been able to express my happiness and joy so yeah so that's a little bit about how we got started and I have to say that um you know in your I think your grandmother and your mother should be proud because the photos that you share on your Instagram account are just so adorable because you do show like because the press of joy when you go to your different like plant excursions around the city and beyond so bencher an adventure it's really low and you're always dressed to the nines you know you know got to show what wow you know got a dress for the for the theme have a month there and in phone.i um you know if they're right yeah at a sony i yep it's a gorgeous one by the way so I'm not really good with the scientific names you know no no and I mean it's Latin for crying exactly right I have a you know regular monster deliciosa I have a bird's nest fern and yes some of these queens are fairly new so something that I try to do is test the strength of plants yeah and just see where they can thrive and where they can grow and so in this kitchen I have West facing windows and the courtyard is enclosed and so when I moved into this apartment about two years ago I sat in the apartment and watch the Sun move through my apartment and so from about 3:00 to 4:30 the sunlight is amazing but it's not like direct ambient light I also have grow lights which is really really helpful and the plants have been responding to it so like she has grown significantly and I love how the plants just hug me strawberry just amazing the love they want to love each other um and so this queen has grown significantly and something that I do another thing that I do that's pretty geeky plant geeky but that's who I am right I move her to the kitchen counter so that she gets more sunlight which is something that she need but this Queen right here seemed to be growing amazingly beautiful that's a beautiful philodendron really sure and and it looks like even you have her growing but her inter notes are quite short so she must be getting some good light you know with your and so she's facing the grow light how long do you have the grow light on for you so if you were to look into my apartment at night it'll be grow blowing a purple hue and everybody probably thinks you're growing weed probably new you know so I usually keep the grill light on all throughout the night and then our when I'm at work I'll turn it off and then when I come back home I'll turn it back so all throughout the night so you like sleep through the grow light yeah I do I do you've closed my bedroom door and then like everything else is purple oh yeah really bright seems to be working pretty well I was skeptical I think there's a lot of reviews about the ability of grow lights to really help plants grow but it seems to be working pretty well well I also think that you have some really you know species that are it can be acceptable in that kind of yeah you have the Aglio NEMA you have some philodendron 's you have the pathos oh you have some Dracaena and the spleen 'i'm which is a fern so these are things that are you know are a little bit more forgiving and I love how you you know test your plants because I feel like I do that the same way in my home where it's like sometimes I'll get two of the same and I'll put it in was gonna make it and like and that's been really amazing because it allows I mean of course it's like such a non scientific approach of doing it but an observational approach of doing in your home of like oh wow you've put up three new leaves over here and you haven't so you know maybe I can move you over here you know and that's and that's part of like how it's like it's a kitchen science in a way yeah it's part of the adventure yeah you know so most of these are like low medium but I hate when folks say like Oh low light means they don't need any light at all there's like no they don't need light to grow and while they may survive and low light they may not thrive and low light so I know that a lot of these plants are I mean some are thriving but I know that when I moved to my next place that I want to make sure that I'm looking at apartment that are good for my plan you're amending your light in a way too hate it got to be creative and so up here snake plants are some of the most resilient plant and I have a variety I think message me at one point you're like have you ever seen this so that was that was one of the plant that I got from your plant swap one that I got from your plants lock she's thriving and doing really really well and so these plants can survive in low light conditions I think one of the great things about the kitchen in particular is that the walls are painted white so the light bounces off the walls which is amazing and so I tried to because of the low light that they receive I don't water them as often because they're not sucking up all that water so I try to keep them as dry as possible in hopes that when I find my next apartment I will be able to provide them with a better environment to drive this is a beautiful variation of this yeah it almost looks like a Bantle sensation and a Whitney Sansevieria Whitney cross yeah but in reverse order yeah I had never seen one like that I have I'm always looking for a very unique and interesting plants and sometimes I am guilty over even though I think you're supposed to do all your research before you get a plant if I see a plant I've never seen before I'm like I have to have she was one of the wines that I did that way right here I have my little like plant hospital where cuttings or propagation you're cutting so these were from plant that were struggling and so I chopped them up and I put them in water looks like they've taken yeah they've taken they have they have to repot some of them like this one right this Queen right here her roots are just wild which is absolutely beautiful and amazing and I'm like I don't want to put it in soil because I love looking at the root but I know the best thing for the planet to put her in so I'm probably gonna do a lot of repotting but you got a lot of good plants material here and then right here I have some cacti I have the ghost cactus this pep ammonia right here with Ashley the very first one no grown it'll babies for the first time for the first time with them really excited they growing baby everyone else has grown baby and so about I would say what about maybe three years ago was like really really hard to find kept ammonia and so I found this at a random little coffee shop I had never seen it in person quickly put it into your walk out the door wish I wish and so because this was one of the first ones that I've spotted this plant that's like 50 bucks 50 bucks and it was a lot smaller at that time but you know she had to have it and so I brought her home and added her to the plant BAM she at one point only had to leave and was looking like she was about to give way but I was like you know what I'm going to make sure that I'm persistent and now she's growing and she's thriving so just a lesson learned that even if a plant is struggling that they all would have the opportunity to bounce back it's so great yeah it just goes to show you like how resilient our plants are now she's growing like crazy and she's almost bigger she's bigger than this girl bigger and had the little baby yeah something interesting is that the plant grow towards the light which it's not a fairly a bad thing for the plant but it's something that I enjoy structurally it just looked interesting and unique so I used to turn her around but now I'm like actually like that it's all facing this way look really interesting I go back and forth with it as mice myself this Queen right here who looks like she's reaching cactus right no she's a you for me ah here she looks like she's reaching out for you to give you a hug so these right here prior to bring her home she did not have these this Grove so yeah that's a that's a euphorbia and they are called ghost cactus as you mentioned which is nice and I think that one that's it was that a cutting or is that just another one this one I bought at a plant shop and it's was about I was fifty bucks Chinatown fYI people write new york shopping china but not anywhere else the chinese out and maybe the farmers market farmers market yes farmers market is well um so twelve bucks yes twelve bucks oh my god right mazing they did not know what they had I saw nothing oh my god wait I think I know what this is great for us wait how much is this okay goodbye like you know what let's take it let's go so um interesting story we all have mishaps I was fixing my grow light to go light fell and chopped the plant in half I actually have the other half my bedroom and I'm like well you know what gonna use that opportunity to have to you know and so I just repotted her and she's growing and thriving she was about maybe like this long when I didn't know she's growing Oh Hutton's and did you did you get your hands prepared for this one I did and I've got some glasses and they are Hardy gloves yeah I just put them more and it was very tricky even through the gardening gloves it was prickling me though but yeah she is growing quite well that's great I'm not sure what kind of cactus this so I'm always interested in like the different shapes and the different growth spurts that they have she was a lot smaller when I purchased her first time and so yeah she's growing like outrageously which is absolutely and it's so beautiful right beautiful it's getting a little skinny on top as mine do is sometimes when I'm not giving it the full assignment we change you know what it's it's part of the process of being a plant lover and and being in a small apartment expecting in New York City yeah you can't always get the lighting no no next apartment yes next apartment apartment don't you aspire this is where I rest my head and so you know where I rest my head I have to have them plants nearby me know so I used to put my air conditioner in this window yeah you are so like me where I'm like air conditioner is not going a reduction of light happen this is the succulent show it has to have my succulent this cactus right here which I believe it's a prickly pear cactus is growing very interesting me kind of nice that it's like oh yeah and so I really think it has to do with the position of my apartment and the way the sunlight reaches and and so believe it or not this when I first got her about three years ago it was just these two Wow fifties to right here and over the years she has grown into beautiful magnificent creature interestingly enough I haven't repotted her this pot has no drainage hole and so I have to be really careful about my cacti I'm just always like watering like three-quarters of the way just to make sure it is no root rot so you know this one I've been trying to so she looked like the boob cactus look like she does look like the boob cactus she's a little perkier yeah a little perkier so I'm I'm not sure if she is the boob cactus there's another cactus that looks really similar I saw her in a store she was much larger but it may be yeah it's so funny cuz like mine are like they hang low yeah yours are perky yours are little more like teenag I hope she's a boob cactus this was another shop where the shopkeeper did not know who she was not like okay well you really know who she is I will find out eventually well I even loved doing these episodes like this where maybe we both don't know the name or whatever because there's always somebody who suggests on the comments like oh good you know it's like kind of the collective high of mindset it's an adventure she will reveal herself when she is ready yeah even if she's not it's so cool because it looks like she's of the same ilk yeah right and then we had this I'm Nick plant right here which is really really interesting I've never seen again I'm always looking for plants that are unique and wanted I've never seen before it reminds me of the wealth in I'm a little bit in terms of the the texture a little Reds on the outside um but I'm not exactly sure I'd like to think that she is a mini well fan maybe or a baby well fan there's so many that looked very similar like even the Kirky eye not the Coppertone one but I think which has now been put into like dracaena path oh I could be wrong by that though because I can't enjoy all these names off the top of my head either since especially because it's just been shift changed but like some of them have very similar like colorations and everything they do and in the cultivars are very close to one another sometimes it is hard to tell them apart yeah but I love her regardless growth structure though and then I have this beauty here um that I got from hortie which is that the plant shop that I'm queen of Community Programs Oh fantastic so there'll be some programming coming out very soon yeah oh do you know but I got this Queen right here and it looks like another euphorbia yeah another euphorbia has some variegation all my plants usually get about maybe I would say an hour to of direct Sun which I find is just enough um and so hopefully she'll start to grow well then you have a purple light here too I hear oh wow you don't sleep with this one I do not think with this on I like to sleep in the dark sorry girl but during the day when I'm like relaxing my boyfriend I are relaxing in the living room I have the light wine and you know play some sharda like some incense and it's a whole mood you know over here I have my pride and joy I'm someone I'm gonna bring her out cuz she needs a little bit of the spotlight so some of my plants actually they hug each other so I'm gonna put this clean over here be careful with her I know and she must have known y'all were coming because now she's starting to grow so um this is a variegated monstera deliciosa and she is my pride and joy they're so hard to come by and it looks like she's putting out a really nice white leaf right there look at that new growth of the white yeah and so I bought her from sprout home actually it was just one stem so with actually three and I was in my old apartment at the time and you know we learn and we make mistake and we get better um I did not know how to properly care for her because the isn't it true that the variegation implants actually make them a little weaker yeah often so yeah yeah yeah and so I was treating her like she was a regular monster deliciosa and wasn't necessarily paying attention to her and somebody leaves got burnt yes I had to cut them off but I was able to see this stem and I've been persistent and she's been now she's this buyer had this had this little thing had been growing for a good two years so I think she knew summer that you were coming so she's like let me show out for my girl and now she's growing this amazing leaf and I'm really really excited this Queen right here the fiddly fig has been one of the moodiest Queens I have grown I mean all my plant adventure oh and why is she been so Moody like what is what is it been for you so I've had about ten Wow these Queens and they've all dropped all of their leaves I just could not figure out how to take care of them and so this Queen would actually gifted to me by crest hardware which is one of my favorite plant shop you know what I haven't really changed my carrot act ik she's in this room where she gets a good amount of ambient light I'm just paying attention to her soil and making sure that I'm not over watering her but she's growing and I just leave - I know so yeah so she's going pretty well I'm really excited but yeah she does not like to be moved so yeah mine are like just don't touch me don't like me I could appreciate it exactly she wants yeah she needs yeah she's right here by the way I love how this one is like propped up with you know you gotta be creative so she's growing amazingly and something that I've learned and as you can see I have a lot of monstera at anthonie I I have a lot of them have one two three four five in the kitchen and propagating numbers and so I think you learn what plants do really well in your home and so I've learned that these particular plants grow really really well something that I'm going to try to do over the summer is to prop them up with a moth pole that they can grow I'm probably gonna put them all in the same a big pot and just have them wrap around because when I first got these and as you can see like they're growing so Viney like which is absolutely amazing yeah and I know a lot of people display them as like hanging basket plants as you have in the kitchen but yeah when you put them up on a pole like it always seems like yeah they really do get beautiful so that's a little project for this summer that I'm going to do oh you know where you have another one right here oh yeah there you go yeah so another one and she's wrapping around you know this shelf right here and then you have like a little horse horse head philodendron yes you didn't get that from the plant swap did you I didn't know I think I got this particular Queen from greenery unlimited in Greenpoint I hadn't seen one in person and so I was like I hopped on the opportunity and she's doing really well as well this right oh wait Carrie I see Valentine's gift it was so my boyfriend actually got this little Queen for me wrote on the card let me hole your heart so one of my faves but she does not grow like I've had her when when you just take the cutting of the leaf it may only ever be a leaf Wow so if you get a little bit more of the stem that's when you'll actually start to see them grow that is good to know so I won't put those expectations on this heart is gonna be as big as its ever gonna know but you know memories yeah beautiful and she's keeping her greeneries to dust that's all that matter so I recently watched your video oh yeah this clip marami argyria she's quite she's struggling but you know I'm gonna we all go through that plan and hopefully one day she'll boom back to life they are a bit temperamental and actually I was just in Chinatown the other day and I saw a big one and I was like well that's it that's gonna be for somebody not that's a nice one so I had another one that I again had intended to bring through a plant swap and I ended up keeping for myself because she just started growing Roane yeah but I'm something that and there wasn't this particular one she was in her nursery pot mm-hmm and I had kept her in there for like a good two weeks and she was growing beautifully another all right she's growing beautifully that must mean it's time to repot her we potted her and she passed away you know I had the same story where I was like I had one took her outside the nursery pot planted her up didn't survive now I'm you know was very shy after that so I still have mine in her nursery pot yeah and she's fine you know because a lot of the experts say oh you're supposed to repot it as soon as you get it because the nursery pot they're bound and they're packed into those things and I'm like actually some of my plants I have about so I also have plants that work at my job in my office I'm a little cubicle um and it looks like literally looks like a little jungle because if you walk over like all you see is like a bunch of plants you're like where's Chris's office go towards the jungle come on and nobody does anybody feel felt inspired to like get plants on their place they have their besties some along the window but I'm a little further back yeah and all of those plants are in their nursery pots and I've had them in the nursery pots for two years and they're growing just fine but I do think there will be a moment when I'll notice that the health of the plant is deteriorating and then that's I don't know so I'm trying to figure out exactly when's the perfect time to repot them because they're doing so well right but I thought your video was really helpful and I did not actually know they prefer she yeah I know that yeah like and well mine and for instance I had in a northeast facing window which is great light for it because Northeast is very gentle light yeah but I left it in the window in the cold temperature and I realize how much I hated that because that's where I started getting a lot of browning on the marks and I had another one that was in towards my south west facing window not directly in it but a little bit further away but it gets extremely hot and did not like that yeah so I being heating a stream cold dream he extreme cold it was just like you know it's like the Goldilocks plant something in between and then over here I have like the neon yeah the I think the philodendron the version not the photos yeah yeah so this is from this sale I'm and this was a little gift from an event that we did it was focusing on diversity in the plant world which i think is so important I'm so glad that that you are involved in that and a representative we had beautiful conversation there was a very impactful event a diverse community of people come together because of their love for these green little creature I'm a little nervous for her because she doesn't get it exactly a lot of light but I guess you could always like if you need there like swap one out now I know so like the the Hoya um that I have right here I know that they prefer brighter light so sometimes I'm like alright I know that you prefer brighter light you probably can survive in like lower light yeah that's what it's always like a shuffle exactly you know I'm so you trade off I can't remember I where I got this Queen from I mean she's literally a queen crimson and do you know if this is a dragon fruit it is so interesting story I was in Chinatown yeah as always mmm it was literally just these two right here and the reason that I really liked it was because it looked like they were hugging she has grown into this beautiful beautiful beautiful Viney plant and it's interesting like some are like really flat some are really thick either they reach for each other which is absolutely beautiful this is another snake plant right here and so I think this is a bigger version of the little spoon yeah that I got from your plant swap this was also a plant that I was supposed to give away but I kept her for myself because she was just absolutely beautiful gorgeous interesting because a lot of people that oh they're cacti I'm like no they're not this Queen actually started off right here oh so like didn't have this second growth right here I put her outside last summer she loved it she loved it so do you put them right outside like on your like a little balcony or a little yeah on my um fire escape which is getting tricky I'm because you mean getting tricky if you ever need to like run outside it's tricky because it's probably illegal but you know I'm not gonna you know talk to my landlord about that if you're watching this sorry but I've had little creatures visit me Oh like squirrels or squirrel and they eat in some of my plants I had a single palm that I put outside I've had it like terribly like toxic I would imagine to an animal she never came back so I don't know I guess I don't know so um I see had these two Queen mailed to me they look great yeah and so these came from his Instagram handle him and his boyfriend have a plant shop in Portland Oh tip Tyler yeah Tyler yeah so Tyler's plant shop in Portland are the Instagram handles your local plant boy and their plant shop is called I think it's REM botanicals yeah REM botanical and they are just thriving they're thriving so beautifully this queen is acting like wrapping around again my plants hug each other because they love each other but this queen is actually wrapping around in the most beautiful way well how do you think like having the plants has really and like affected your life um tons of new amazing friends that you know share my love and joy for these green girl and it's just so interesting how plants have served as the catalyst to building such a robust diverse caring loving community which has been really really amazing did you have do you feel like you had that community prior - no not at all not at all it's interesting when I bought my first Passos it was really just me trying to find something new I'm an extrovert I'm Gloria no no no you know I get my energy from other people and um I had to find something that you know nurture the nurture within me but only require just me and plant just became that you know I just started one of my own little botanical adventures riding my bike around Brooklyn trying out different plant shop and sometimes I was just thrown out from the world that was really just put my headphones then I'll Google to plants I would bring them home I repot them I was snap photo and my boyfriend he was like you're really into this and I was set it up and I would take photos he's like why don't you start an Instagram oh my god what is so good at least he wasn't jealous no I give him just as much love and so you know when I first started the Instagram account it was really just focused on the plan and so I started diving out into the plant community like this is interesting I don't really see anyone like me um you know black queer them who you know it's just you know showing that they're in this world yeah and he wanted to represent yeah let me you know putting my own character and my body into the photos and it just grew into this am a community these amazing interactions that I'm having with amazing people and now no folks at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden at the New York Botanical Garden has opportunity to meet you so yeah so I'm gonna just continue to to do that and have fun with it and see where this plant adventure takes me well that's just marvelous and I love that you bring so much joy and so much love to this and I'm so glad you've come out to like represent you know in so many different kinds of ways like you said in your exploring all your different passions all the things that you've been working towards and you're able to filter them into the plant community in such a powerful way so thank you for that because that is so awesome thank you and I do have to say we must have to trade clothes like I kind of how did you like this house plant home tour tell me in the comments below and if you liked this episode give it a thumbs up and hit the subscribe button if you'd like more videos like this in your feed then also remember to click the notifications valve in the meantime check out my latest book how to make a plant love you cultivate green space in your home and heart available at booksellers online and in a store near you and don't forget about the plant shop pub crawl bring your book into over 100 designated plant shops and garden centers across nine countries and get 15% off your purchases see what shops are participating on my blog at homestead Brooklyn you you

Channel: Summer Rayne Oakes

Views: 401,646

Rating: 4.9132528 out of 5

Keywords: Summer Rayne Oakes, Homestead Brooklyn, Plant One On Me, plants, houseplants, indoor plants, garden, gardening, house plants, houseplant care, Plant Kween, Christopher Griffin, Houseplant home tour, home tour houseplants, houseplants for small apartments, houseplants apartment living, plant kween home tour, houseplant tour plant kween, plant community, houseplant community, houseplant community instagram

Id: Cxhw_pakiC4

Length: 34min 35sec (2075 seconds)

Published: Thu Jul 25 2019