Inside a Hong Kong home filled with plants – ‘the weirder the better’
Ferns and air plants are the main design element in this ‘indoor jungle’, where every piece has a personal connection to the family that lives there
Indoor plants have long been popular with urban dwellers craving a little nature in their homes. Plants’ mood-boosting, toxin-absorbing and noise-reducing properties are often cited as tangible health benefits. When yoga instructor Jen Kentrup and her family – husband Bill and sons Griffin, 15, and Theo, 13 – moved to a three-bedroom 1,500 sq ft rental flat in Chung Hom Kok last May, she made greenery the main design element, fleshing out her dream for an “indoor jungle”.
With the aid of interior-design app Planner 5D, Kentrup created a floor plan to devise the green space, making the most of the flat’s wide windows, high ceilings and balcony to showcase a huge variety of unusual looking plants at every eye level.
“I love the weirdos, the weirder the better,” Kentrup says. “My favourites are less plant, more sculpture. I have a fascination for staghorn ferns and tillandsia, which are also known as air plants. They are so cool and quite easy to keep, too.” Both species are epiphytes, plants that grow on trees or other plants but take no nutrients from them and, according to Kentrup, require nothing more technical than a weekly bath.
“This staghorn is one of my favourites,” she says, pointing to an exuberant mass of long fronds growing on a board hanging from a window handle. “It’s so happy and prolific. It grows these round exterior leaves to cover up its roots and changes happen so quickly that it’s stunning to watch.”
At the last count, there were 157 plants, mostly from the flower market in Mong Kok.