If you home office has no or low natural, fear not. You can still install and find beautiful plants for your home office with no windows. A lot of plants can live and thrive with just artificial light from your lamps.
But how do you find the best plants for offices with no windows? I got you covered in this guide where I go into depth with the best choices and why some plants are better suited for the low-light life in a home office with no windows.
Light is essential for all plant growth. The plant’s growth, length of active life, and energy derived from photosynthesis depend on the amount of light it receives.
So why do some plants thrive in low natural light or low light? In the same way, plants thrive on forest floors, beneath the canopy of trees some plants can survive in low light. If you imagine standing in the Amazon rainforest, it is dark, hot, and wet yet many plants seem to thrive, or you are experiencing a burning desert with incredibly dry heat during the day and at night almost zero temperatures.
Why are these plants able to thrive in such hard conditions?
The conditions they are growing in are extreme and these plants have adapted to harsh environments. Through continued scientific experimentation in the lab, we have been able to genetically modify these same plants. Actually, horticultural companies are now able to commercialize specific plants for specific purposes within our homes, including low-light and no-window home-office spaces.
The 7 Best Plants For Your Home Office With No Windows
For low-light conditions, a general guideline is to choose plants with darker foliage. The dark green colour means that the plants are very efficient at photosynthesis and can get by on less sunlight.
A room with no windows will make it difficult for even the most shade-tolerant plants. In that situation, you can help your plants by leaving on artificial lights for a few hours each day.
1. Spider plant (Chlorophytum comosum)
- Pets: Non-Toxic
- Light: Partial shade
- Water: Moderate moisture
- Colour Varieties: Green or variegated foliage
2. Golden Pothos (Epipremnum aureum)
- Pets: Toxic
- Light: Partial shade to total shade
- Water: Moderate moisture
- Colour Varieties: Green or variegated foliage
3. Peace Lily (Spathiphyllum)
- Pets: Toxic
- Light: Partial shade to full shade
- Water: Moderate to high moisture
- Colour Varieties: Dark green foliage, white flowers
4. ZZ Plant (Zamioculcas zamiifolia)
- Pets: Toxic
- Light: Partial shade to total shade
- Water: Moderate moisture
- Colour Varieties: Dark green foliage
5. Philodendron (Philodendron spp.)
- Pets: Toxic
- Light: Partial shade
- Water: Moderate moisture
- Colour Varieties: Green foliage
6. Chinese Evergreen (Aglaonema commutatum)
- Pets: Toxic
- Light: Partial shade
- Water: Moderate to high moisture
- Colour Varieties: Dark green to silver foliage
7. Swiss Cheese Plant (Monstera Deliciosa)
- Pets: Toxic
- Light: Partial shade
- Water: Moderate moisture
- Colour Varieties: Dark green
The Benefits Of Keeping Plants In Your Home Office With Low Light
Including plants in the design of our workplaces can have a positive impact on happiness, creativity, and productivity, which is why I think that plants will be an even more significant trend in Home-office designs.
But just because you have a home office with no windows does not mean you shouldn’t get plants in there. You should, as there are a bunch of important benefits in doing so.
Some Of The Benefits Of Keeping Plants In The Home-Office Include:
Boosting aesthetic value
Working in a visually stimulating environment rather than a sparse one will help you foster creativity while working at home and at the physical workplace. But choosing plants for your home office with no windows will make a huge difference as you can really get some life into you low-light environment.
Reduce stress levels and prevents sickness
This study found that daily interaction with plants helps to reduce psychological and physiological stress. Incorporating plants into your home office with no windows can help you create a clean working environment. Plants remove toxins and clean air helps to reduce employee sickness enabling a healthier environment. If you work a lot from home or maybe in a hybrid model you will need a healthy home office, regardless of windows.
Creates a quieter environment
Plants help to absorb excess noise and can also help to create different ‘zones’, separating the home office from the family zone. If you have your home office in a corner of a larger room you will really reap the benefits of having plants around. This can make your space feel like a separate room to work from.
Increases productivity
Another benefit of plants in home-office design may have a positive effect on perceived productivity. The 2015 Human Spaces report, which studied 7,600 office workers, found that nearly two-thirds (58%) of workers have no live plants in their workspaces. Those whose environments incorporated natural elements reported a 15% higher well-being score and a 6% higher productivity score than employees whose workspaces didn’t include such elements.
Regardless of you office having windows it can be really beneficial to include plants in your home setup.
What To Consider When Choosing Plants For Your Window-Less Home Office
It can be frustrating when your lighting situation determines which plants you can get. Strategic plant choices make the difference in transforming a dim, plant-less interior into a functional green space.
Biophilic Design is an innovative way of designing places where we live, work and learn. It is a design philosophy that encourages the incorporation of nature into the design of the built environment.
The most important factors when choosing plants for your Home-office include
- Light. Some plants survive in any light situation but plants placed in low-light areas will need to be replaced more often
- Water. Different plants have different water needs. Choose plants that generally are self-sufficient and require little maintenance.
- Temperature. Most plants love consistently warm locations with little or no drafts. including doorways that get cold throughout the night.
- Space. There are so many ways to incorporate plants into your home office. Choosing a size or a variety of sizes to fill containers or create barriers will add visual interest to your space.
Finding solutions can be as easy as choosing large plants, having wide dark green leaves, or surviving naturally in harsh climates. Local plant nurseries offer an assortment of specialist plants for the home office. Any of these options is sure to produce a spectacular green home office even with no natural light.
Help your plants survive in your window-less home office
Through innovation and technology, we can recreate the temperature, moisture, and light via artificial sources allowing our plants to thrive in low-light conditions. Our home offices will often have air conditioning, desk lamps, and little else, so is this enough?
By simply adding a basic aromatic oil diffuser which many homes have already or a more expensive humidifier many of the problems are removed allowing your home-office plants to thrive. If all you need is a little extra humidity for a room, running an essential oil diffuser without including the essential oils in the water is perfectly fine. Of course, humidifiers are designed to add moisture to the air.
Incandescent lights are great for lighting a room or growing low-light houseplants, such as vines, ferns or dracaenas. They have limited utility for growing plants with higher light requirements. LED lights are great because they’re energy-efficient, emit little heat and last for years. However, horticultural lights for plants with high light requirements are best.
My name is Frederik
I am a passionate marketeer who loves the freedom that comes with working from home whenever I choose to do so.
I love getting nerdy with every single detail about making everything related to my home just a tiny bit better.
That is what motivates me to write about home stuff on this blog.