How to use flowers to decorate balconies and loggias?

In urban conditions, decorating a balcony with fresh flowers becomes not only visually attractive, but even a solution for the design of space that is useful for people's health. However, in order for green friends to please the owners with their appearance for a long time, it will be necessary to find out in advance which crops are worth planting and how to properly care for them.

Decorating a balcony with flowers in summer can be done using any design option - from Japanese to country. Although you can decorate the loggia without using a specific style, for example, simply decorating the wall with bindweed and grapes. A flower garden should only meet the needs and desires of the owners, and therefore, being in a clearly fenced-off room, it may not even match the style of the rest of the apartment.

Before equipping a balcony, you need to evaluate its size, take into account the color of the walls and the available finish. In the event that the decor is based on the use of climbing crops, it is important to consider possibilities for organizing a trellis or ropes on which the elongating shoots will be placed.

It is quite simple to decorate a loggia only with plants in boxes and pots - it is enough to adhere to the rules typical for landscape design, that is combine bushes of different heights, select spectacular combinations of shades and textures.

For ampelous plants, reliable fasteners will be required, which will ensure safety both for the inhabitants of the apartment and for the plantings themselves.When organizing a vertical wall composition it is better to adhere to a certain sequence.

Of course, the flowers on the balcony are a bright and unusual decoration of the space, usually not worth a lot of money. The limited flowering period allows you to create a new composition every year and completely change the appearance of the loggia. It is not at all necessary to grow seedlings on your own, and therefore the whole process of preparing for the summer season does not take much time and effort.

Small disadvantages include the need to care for plantings, including watering, and pest control, and treatment of diseases. Probably the appearance of midges or some kind of insects that will not only settle on the balcony, but also penetrate the apartment.

In general, the choice of this or that plant is determined depending on how much sun enters the balcony, that is, which side of the world it is looking at. Most cultures will thrive on the southeast loggia, which allows for twelve hours of natural light.

For the north side choose shade-loving conifers, which can even be quite large if space permits. In this case, it is about dwarf pine, thuja, Canadian spruce or juniper. For a more aesthetic picture, they are complemented ivy, periwinkle or other ground cover. Evergreen boxwood in most cases it is combined with violets or a cross.

It makes sense to fill a balcony with good lighting with annuals, for example, petunias, asters, calendula, chrysanthemums, phlox or other common crops. Popular biennials include daisies and pansies. On arches and supports, it is customary to develop a variety of loaches, including sweet peas and ornamental beans.

In the summertime, you can also take out some indoor plants on the balcony, for example, begonia or pelargonium, various succulents and cacti. If the balcony is shady, then flowers such as fuchsia, cloves, verbena or even tobacco.

In order to choose the right flowering inhabitants on the balcony, you must clearly understand what design is planned. The most convenient container for flowers is considered to be a box, the depth and width of which correspond to 180 millimeters, and the length reaches one meter. You can plant any flowers you like in it, regardless of their size and focusing only on the visual combination.

It is better to take from ampelous plants petunias, nasturtiums and fuchsiasthat look great and are not whimsical. For medium-sized balconies, horizontal landscaping is more suitable, which means that plants located along the railings and walls should not be too large and heavy.

The overall picture of the design of the balcony will largely depend on the container in which flowers and shrubs will be planted. Plants can be planted both in boxes and in pots, but it is important to select green friends so that they turn out to be commensurate with the dimensions of the containers, and also adhere to the general style.

Plastic boxes are the cheapest, and they also help to retain moisture. Clay vessels give the plant the opportunity to "breathe", but the soil in them dries out quickly, so the flowers will need more frequent watering.

Flowers are often planted in containers made from glazed ceramics. Such containers look attractive, but the plants themselves do not feel so good, since the soil in the container tends to acidify. To smooth the situation, it is recommended to initially pick up a plastic container, place it in a ceramic one, and then plant it.

Wooden flower boxes are considered a stylish and sustainable choice, in addition, they can almost always be made with your own hands and thereby significantly save money. Best used for structures softwood, and when planting flowers directly in the box, it is necessary to pre-treat it with a solution that prevents the development of putrefactive processes.

When dealing with additional decoration of the container itself, it is better to give preference to light shades in order to avoid overheating of the root system. Vertical gardening is carried out using a variety of convenient designs, for example, canvas with pockets, which is easy to do with your own hands.

It will be enough to sew large fabric pockets on a dense canvas, and place pots of a suitable size or plastic bags filled with seedlings in them. The structure is fixed to the wall with reliable hinges.

You cannot do without a trellis on the balcony, which is a support for a variety of bindweed. The grill can be purchased at the store, or you can make it yourself from cords or mesh. Pot holders always look good, especially those with vertical supports. Some of them have casters, making it much easier to water or reorganize designs.

When choosing horizontal gardening, the containers are placed on the shelves of the shelves or along the railing.

It is necessary to place flowers on the balcony in the summer in such a way as to take into account the size of the existing plants, and their shape, and the color palette. First of all, the plan and the facade of the balcony are drawn, and several possible options for the placement of containers are being developed.

At the same time, plants should not block each other's lighting or find themselves in a draft, especially on an open balcony. Large pots are best placed on the floor of the loggia, and medium-sized containers or placed on shelves, or attach from the outside to the outside of the balcony using a special curtain rod with a ring, made of metal.

It is logical to place climbing crops or woody vines on the wall or side of the balcony, next to the dividing wall. The composition can be supplemented with open boxes that can be hung along the railing. Large tubs with tall bushes are placed in the corners. Inside a glazed balcony, even a small one, shelves mounted on parallel walls will look good. The wooden surface is left either in the most natural state, or decorated with self-adhesive film, acrylic paints or mosaics.

A very beautiful and original balcony is obtained if you use an ordinary step-ladder to decorate it... Made of metal, it is robust enough to accommodate a large number of versatile plant pots. On each bar there are two pots of different colors and shapes with small plants.

This composition turns out to be very bright and lively. In addition to the stairs, on the balcony there are hanging pots with blooming petunias fixed on the beams, as well as several pots of unusual shapes located on the pedestal.

On the other balcony, in contrast to the first example, all the containers used become an organic component of the integral interior. The design uses all kinds of containers - wall-mounted, table-top, heavy pots standing on the floor or stools, as well as containers fixed to the balcony bar.

While not all pots are the same, they are similar in design or color. Most of the plants are in bloom; the composition also contains several indoor representatives of the flora.

The simplest option to improve the balcony space is placement of flowering specimens in elongated pots, fixed on a balcony rail... In addition, several compact pots can be stacked on a rack.

The next video will tell you how to decorate an open balcony.