Millennials might be to blame for the death of television and health insurance but there’s one area that’s blooming because of them: house plants.
Their sales are growing by about 2 per cent a year in a $1.3 billion retail nursery industry, and the biggest increase in buyers has been from the 18-to-35 age group. That growth has birthed new jobs and services to meet demand.
Enter: the plant stylist.
Catalogues, showrooms and social media are filled with leafy images of foliage-laden interiors and young Australians are desperate to recreate them in their own homes.
That’s how Alana Langan found herself working as a plant stylist, among other things.
Ms Langan runs Melbourne’s Ivy Muse with business partner Jacqui Vidal, and said they’d adapted in line with trends and customer demand.
They started six years ago, just selling Melbourne-made floor pot stands online. Customers wanted to see them in action, so they opened a small retail space. Then customers wanted to buy the plants that adorned the stands, then the pots, and before long, they were asking Ms Langan and Ms Vidal to recreate the now-expanded store’s display aesthetic in their own homes.
With a background as an interior stylist, it was a natural way for Ms Langan to enter a burgeoning job sphere.
“We’ve grown organically – by paying attention to trends and listening to our customers,” Ms Langan said.
Now, fitting out homes and commercial spaces with carefully designed plant placement is a key part of their business.
Why house plants? Because science
Trends come and go, but indoor plants are rooted deep in our make-up as human beings, Dominique Hes says.
Dr Hes, who holds a science degree in botany and a PHD in architecture, told The New Daily there’s something called biophelia that’s to thank for our fondness for indoor plants.
Biophelia is a human’s innate need for connection with the environment. Almost intangible, in today’s age when many people live in city apartments or properties without backyards, that connection can be recreated indoors.
“People are just begging for greenery in their lives,” Dr Hes said.
It’s not just the primal side plants appeal to; people are seeking out indoor plants because of the boost they give to our wellbeing.
There’s some research into how plants can improve indoor air quality, Dr Hes said.
Dr Hes was part of the team that created the Plant Life Balance app, which allows a user to kit-out their own space with house plants, which then show how the air quality would react to their chosen new green friends.
To your door
You can sign up to get regular deliveries of wine, cheese, your favourite magazine, new beauty products – and now, house plants.
Brisbane’s Rhiannon Campbell started Australia’s first subscription service especially for house plants in late 2018.
Similar services already existed in the United Kingdom, and as a lover of plants, Ms Campbell wanted to jump on the opportunity for Australia.
She’s since sold the business on, but saw it grow from two monthly subscribers to 120-plus in 12 months.
Now, she runs The Plant Lounge, and says she’s watched as the market develops around her.
“It’s a nice community,” Ms Campbell said.
Expect to see more and more plant-based ventures pop up – the trend doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere.
So what’s next?
Ms Langan said we can expect the biophelic trend to continue in home design, with plants being built into the home from the outset rather than a post-addition.
“Think, window boxes built into kitchens to grow herb gardens in,” she said.
Dr Hes said plants will continue to permeate our lives: the next trend she predicts is music – it’s been shown that plants, through hooking them up to feedback devices and playing them music, they’ll and through certain technology, change the tempo or pitch of the music.
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