Recommendations Ideas, Tips & Guides

If you’re a gardener—and since you picked up this magazine I’m guessing you are—you probably get peppered with plant questions all the time. I know I do. Take Thanksgiving just this past year. My dad was looking for some trees that would “subtly block” his neighbors who had recently put a pool in their backyard. So in between doling out mashed potatoes and deciding if I wanted apple or pumpkin pie for dessert, I pulled out Dirr’s Hardy Trees and Shrubs from the nearby bookshelf to spark some suggestions. (That illustrated encyclopedia was a Christmas gift a few years back to help my dad make plant choices without my help. Its successfulness in doing so is still up for debate.) This same scenario takes place at summer picnics, children’s birthday parties, or even on planes when my seatmate asks what I do for a living. After I answer, it’s common to hear, “Wow, that’s so interesting. Listen, I have this spot where I need something …” Most of these inquiries center around trees too—and I get it. A tree is an investment with a capital “I.” Not only is a tree the single most expensive plant you will likely purchase for your landscape, but it is also the longest lived. Trees don’t like to be moved, they generally require a bit more effort to get established than a perennial or shrub, and they are usually the focal point of a specific area. For all of these reasons, everyone wants to choose the right tree.

Poinsettias are ubiquitous holiday plants. I always feel like I need at least one to complete my Christmas decorating. Some years I go for the traditional red hue, others I opt for something more unique, like variegated leaves or bright pink bracts. Poinsettias are native to Mexico and Central America, so these tropical plants often don’t last in a home beyond the holidays. However, if they survived, it is possible to keep them for the following year and, after a period of darkness, get them to rebloom for you. So, if you’re wondering, when should I put my poinsettia in the dark, I will explain how to care for your plant throughout the year, until it’s time to display it once again for the holidays.

Kelsey Hansen

IKEA

Often, these are timeless items that have truly stood the test of time, but there’s also room for innovations that have transformed the way we garden – battery-powered tools that have done away with electric cables and noisy, smelly two-stroke fuel, for example. We asked the country’s top head gardeners which tools they couldn’t contemplate gardening without.

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These days, it's certainly acceptable to think beyond the traditional all-white kitchen, but you should be mindful when making your color selection.

Heluva Good!

If you’re constantly tripping over wayward shoes in your entryway, battling piles of paperwork on your kitchen island, or stepping on LEGOs (ouch!), it’s easy to fall into the frustration a cluttered space can cause.

Regular mowing is essential to the production and maintenance of a good lawn. Unless this is assured, expense, and work on all kinds of recommended treatments are of little value.

While painting a room isn’t necessarily a difficult DIY job, it’s not always easy—how many coats does one wall need again?

Thinking about incorporating some thrifted or vintage pieces into your home? The pros are all for doing so, and we spoke with a number of secondhand-loving interior designers to gather their most useful takeaways for what to keep top of mind when decorating with preloved finds.

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With winter approaching, the days are getting shorter and temperatures are falling fast. As we spend more time in the comfort of our homes, it’s always nice to get our spaces feeling extra cozy.

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With his brother Chris, Paul Blom selects premium bulbs to be sold to discerning customers by the family company, Bloms Bulbs.

With his partner Graham Robeson, Alan Gray has developed Norfolk’s East Ruston Old Vicarage into a remarkable 32-acre garden. From colourful crocus to cheerful narcissus, bulbs are vital to their borders.

Whether you find it while dumpster diving, curb shopping, or thrifting, stumbling upon a perfectly intact piece of discarded furniture at no or low cost to you could result in an intriguing addition to your decor.

Anyone in search of planting ideas for their garden in the colder months is spoilt for choice when it comes to sources of inspiration. Up and down Britain there are sterling examples of gardens planted for winter interest: Cambridge University Botanic Garden boasts one of the earliest; Wakehurst Place is home to one of the more recent; then there’s Bodnant, Dunham Massey, the Savill Garden – the list goes on. One thing they have in common though is that they’re all quite large, and gardeners could be forgiven for feeling they need a separate ‘winter area’ or hefty acreage to create anything worthwhile in their own plots. Not so, says David Jordan, senior gardener at Anglesey Abbey, who cares for its well-known Winter Garden and has a host of winter plants to recommend that will easily integrate into your existing garden.

Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page.

The housing market is finally starting to loosen up a little in 2024. But if you’re looking to get the most value out of your home before putting it on the market, you might want to consider a remodel.

Move over, awkwardly placed windows. If you're dealing with windows that are positioned a bit strangely throughout your house or are oddly shaped, we're here to help.

Easyplant has released its list of plant trends for the new year, along with aesthetic styling tips to match every plant.

Living deep in the Irish countryside as I do, surrounded by a centuries-old patchwork of farm fields, hedgerows and leafy pockets of ancient native woodland, a clear winter night sky is a thing of profound beauty. It is filled with the otherworldly shimmer of a host of constellations, familiar to me from my childhood.

Bare-root roses (those that are dug up from the nursery’s fields during dormancy and come without soil around their roots) are delivered from November onwards and can be planted throughout the winter. Now is the time to order for the widest choice of varieties and, come summer, the reward will be the most colourful, fragrant and quintessentially English garden flowers there are.

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Reviews and recommendations are unbiased and products are independently selected. Postmedia may earn an affiliate commission from purchases made through links on this page.

Though it's a new year, you might still feel bogged down by the clutter of yesteryear. Between overflowing dresser drawers, entryways with mounds of muddy, left shoes (where did the right ones go?), and the nightmare that is your junk drawer, it’s easy for any home to become overwhelmed with clutter.  Disorganized, no more! 2024 can be your year to get organized for good. With a few easy-to-implement organizing habits, a cleaner, clutter-free home is within reach.

If you're one of the many people who use the start of a new year to take on a house-wide clean out, you may be wondering which categories you should think about tackling first.

Bathroom storage is a problem that many people encounter at one time or another. Whether you are dealing with a small space, an awkward layout, or an old house that doesn’t have built-in closets and storage solutions, finding the space to store all your bathroom essentials in a functional and stylish way is an ongoing challenge. We asked two interior designers to share their top tips for storing bathroom essentials, and they had some valuable insight to share. 

For some homeowners and renters, standard-height ceilings offer a cozy and intimate atmosphere. But for others, they can often make spaces seem smaller and at times darker. If you fall in the latter group, don’t worry.

The New Year is officially upon us, and while most of us don’t focus on sprucing up our patios and porches until the early spring, interior designers already have their thumb on the pulse of this year’s biggest outdoor decor trends. Here are eight patio and porch trends to watch out for in 2024, according to design experts. 

Ann VanderWiel Wilde

One great way to wake up from our collective holiday haze is to get focused on cleaning up and clearing out.

If you’ve been scrolling through your TikTok feed, ooh-ing and ahh-ing over charmingly layered decor styles, you’re not alone.

Hello, new year, hello, newly organized home. The start of a fresh year is the ideal time to revamp your organizing ways, creating a clutter-free home that feels like you. Where should you start, though? We asked three professional organizers what organizing trends they see on the 2024 horizon. From what materials to use to areas to declutter to technologies to take advantage of, they were full of practical home organizing advice. Read on for their seven recommendations.