Creative ideas for a mini garden

With an elegant home in a chrome and glass high rise building, you are no doubt proud of your little haven, but there may be times when you regret not being able to have a proper garden or green space to enjoy. Greenery can refresh your mind, purify the air around you and soothe your eyes.

All you need is some creativity to set up your own mini garden in the most compact of spaces in your home or even your office if you don’t have a balcony. Here are some amazing ideas to start you off:

Recycle your broken pots and create a multi-level step garden

If you have had plants before and the broken pots are lying around, don’t throw them away, as you can create a terraced mini garden with them.

• Simply by arranging the broken pieces in a step format, you can have different levels within the pot, with the broken part giving perfect visibility to the entire set up.
• Now, to hold the pieces or ‘steps’ in place, just embed them in the soil.
• The best plants for such a mini garden are the ones that need little water because the pot will not retain the moisture much, owing to the breakage.
• Succulents and cacti are the best kinds you can choose since they need little maintenance and are rather hardy.
• You can use a combination of plants to make the mini garden colourful and variegated.

Wall gardens to add greenery to any room

A walled garden can bring a soothing calm to a crowded room and this is a great way to add character to a dull, drab office boardroom too.

• Just nail a series of metal pot holders and place the pots in them to create your wall garden.
• Or, you can use a wooden frame with the pot holders so that you can change the location later if you want to.
• For this kind of mini garden, the best thing is to have one kind of plant in each pot so that there is some symmetry in the midst of the variety that the entire garden presents.
• Purple passion, agave, dwarf caladiums and lemon cypress make good choices for your wall garden.

A little fairyland right in your home

This one is a really creative idea that might interest your kids in gardening too.

• Just use a plastic tray in which you have made holes in the bottom, evenly spaced, so that the excess water can drain away.
• Now, fill it with soil and then add features like little houses made out of wooden blocks, fences made with painted ice cream sticks, and maybe roads created with pebbles.
• Add a little pool by pushing a small plastic container into the soil and filling it up with water.
• You can add pixie, fairy, elf, gnome toys, the ones you get on funky key chains often, or go online to shop for them at attractive prices, to complete your very own little fairyland.
• Then, of course, you need to add the plants. Miniature ivy is the best plant to grow in your fairytale land because it grows thickly and evenly and covers the soil beautifully, giving it a lush look.

A mini kitchen garden with herbs you can use

An herb garden is a great idea because you can simply pluck them fresh and use them in your cooking to make your food all the more healthy and delicious. Well, you don’t need much space in your kitchen for this.

• Just use a window sill or put the pots along the side of the wall on your kitchen counter where the sunlight falls for some part of the day.
• You can grow mint (pudina), coriander (dhania), fenugreek (methi), Mexican mint/ Mexican oregano (paththa ajwain) etc. right on your kitchen countertop in a row of small pots.
• You can either get hold of some affordable yet vibrant pots online or paint old ones and unleash your creativity.
• For your herb garden, you can use bright cups or bowls or even mason jars and decorate their exteriors with glitter if you wish to.

A natural air purifier in your mini garden

Did you know that the humble aloe vera plant clears the air from harmful toxins like benzene and formaldehyde that may be released from the paint used in your home or some cleaners? Now this zero cost, natural, efficient, home air purifier can quietly get to work in your mini garden.

• A rock garden is the right setting for your aloe vera plant. You can create an interesting looking rock garden in one corner by putting up a tray filled with soil and rounded pebbles, and maybe cover the area with miniature ivy.
• Your aloe vera pot can be placed in the middle of this rock garden, buried in the sand so that you create the impression of the aloe plant in the middle of a rocky little nook.
• Aloe Vera’s roots tend to go deep, so you need a deeper pot while the miniature ivy can grow well in a shallow tray too.

Now that you have some cool ideas to get you started, come up with your own creative takes and set up your mini garden right away in your home or office!