Before buying your first or hundredth houseplant, the main factor to consider is always natural light. Sunlight! In this article, you will learn how to assess the light levels of different areas of your home.
What type of light do you have at home?
The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. The first step to understanding the level of light in your home is to understand which cardinal points your windows face. To help, any smartphone or smartwatch has a compass app.
Once you understand where the window of the room you are evaluating faces, you can draw your first conclusions:
- If it is a north-facing window, the room will have reduced to moderate light. For indoor environments, the best plants are those that adapt to environments with reduced light.
- If it is a south-facing window, the room is very bright or receives direct sunlight. The ideal plants for these conditions are cacti and succulents.
- A room in the house facing east has a lot of indirect light. This condition is ideal for plants like Calatheas, which like a lot of natural light, without direct sunlight, or for climbing plants, which adapt to various levels of natural light. In these rooms, some direct sunlight may appear, which will only be a concern for plants that are close to the window.
- Finally, the room with the ideal level of light for indoor plants is the room with windows facing west. In this position, the room receives a lot of indirect light and some weak sunlight at the end of the day. After this initial assessment, it is essential to take into account other factors that can influence the levels of light in the rooms of the house throughout the day and the choice of where to place the plants.
It is important to understand whether there is any physical barrier blocking the sunlight, whether inside or outside. If the window faces south, but there is a building blocking the light right in front of the window, that room will probably have little light. Or, if there is some furniture blocking the light in the south-facing room, that room may also not be suitable for plants that need a lot of light.
Another factor to take into account is the size of the windows. Obviously, small windows let in less light. It is also important to note how many hours a day the window blinds are open. The more hours, the more light will enter the room.
The important thing is to be clear about the factors to take into account when measuring the level of light in the room in your home that you want to decorate with plants, always assuming that no indoor plant can withstand environments without natural light.
If you have any questions, Bioma will be happy to help! Contact us !
