Stewarts Office Plants

We supply many businesses across the South, from Sussex and Surrey, through Hampshire and Dorset to Wiltshire and Somerset. For more information about the services we offer visit our home page, or contact us here. In this blog you'll find news, interesting snippets, stories and pictures of our staff's adventures out on the road.

Thursday, December 24, 2020

At Christmas, spare a thought for the lonely...

Poor lonely Christmas tree

At this festive time when, despite all the Covid restrictions, we like to spend our time with family and friends, we should spare a thought for the lonely amongst us. In this case the lonely Christmas trees.

Back story to this image: I have a large client in Bristol that I look after myself (the Norwegian Mountain Cat / Cake is Real client), and from their window I have a view of an office building opposite, several floors of which also have plants. I have noticed that one floor has been in darkness all the way since March and the plants have been pushed over to by the windows, and are looking rather sorry for themselves. 

To my bafflement, early this week a fully decorated Christmas tree could be seen in the window. I do wonder what the point is. I'm also on the verge of going all Zen and wondering that if an office has a Christmas tree that no one sees, does it in fact exist at all? 

On that philosophical note, merry Christmas to one and all; here's hoping 2021 is an improvement on 2020!

Friday, December 11, 2020

Christmas trees - here's what you didn't have!


Jazz hands Christmas tree! 

Just to reinforce what I said in my previous post here is a great illustration of one of the perils of live Christmas tree ordering. 

This is an 8-9ft tree (they are ordered in bands by height) which we had ringfenced for a very exacting client who wants a tall tree but doesn't have a huge amount of space. It looked like a nice slim tree in the net so we put it aside for them. 

It should be a nice even conical shape from tip to base, instead it looks like two trees stapled together. 

The funny thing is if you put a hand over the screen and cover up the top 40% of the photo, the rest is a reasonably nice 5ft tree, albeit with a rather thick top stem. 

Luckily we slightly over-order Christmas trees so that we can mitigate for eventualities like this. 

Fear not: it hasn't been cut down in vain. Someone wanted a whole lot of foliage to make garlands out of, so it was of use. Just not all in one bit. 

Jonathan


Christmas trees - here's what you could have had

 

9ft artificial Christmas tree

 

As is usually the case it's slightly perverse of me to start marketing our Christmas tree service as we have no finished deliveries, but as is often the case I am filing photos of same and taking the opportunity to show off our product. 

This is one example of the ~ 40 trees we delivered this year, a particularly fine 9ft artificial tree in teal and silver. 

Most of the trees we deliver are artificial, save some we have done for long-standing clients; quite simply in a commercial setting we think they are far superior to the real thing. 

For a start most offices are simply too hot to install a cut tree and then expect it to look good right up until Christmas. Also, even with the best of intentions, some live trees simply aren't as good as others in terms of shape, thickness etc. 

Secondly the artificial trees are so good these days that habit really is the only reason to continue to have live. 

Finally, they are much less messy! Put it this way we take a broom and a long-suffering vacuum cleaner in whenever we deliver a live tree, neither with an artificial one.  

So if you want one next year get in touch nice and early (we start organising deliveries in late summer!); we have some decorated trees in stock so you'd be welcome to see one in the flesh (in the needle?) at our Broomhill HQ.

Jonathan

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 


Wednesday, November 25, 2020

Feature pest: hard scale

 

In order to save this blog from being just "Jonathan posts funny signs from offices" here is one of my irregular posts about a common houseplant pest. This one is a little swine, thankfully not the most common, but very tenacious when you do have it. 

Hard scale is a part of the larger scale family that also includes my favourite Snow Scale and also Mealy Bug, which many people don't realise is a type of scale at all.  

Now, the reason hard scale is a particularly tenacious pest is because it is hard! As you can see in this image they somewhat resemble barnacles. 

This means that scale is well-armoured (so nonabsorbent) against any pesticide applications etc. In practice the younger softer scales may be killed, but not the harder ones, so the key if using pesticides is repeated applications. 

I am told that rubbing alcohol is also quite effective. But I have found the best method is physical removal, to whit scraping them off with a finger. 

Jonathan

Monday, November 23, 2020

More silly office signs...

 

I'm no plumber, but...

All I ever seem to post on this blog now is funny pictures from our clients' offices. 

Part of the reason is that we now have a Facebook page (hint, hint) which is where I tend to post the more obviously promotional stuff, and pretty pictures of plants. 

Anyway I'm not stopping, so there. 

I took this photo in a Hampshire engineering company, specifically in the loo. Now, I'm no plumber, but I'm fairly sure putting a sign on the window won't stop a tap running. 

My best guess is it is one of those motion-activated ones and somehow the light through the window sets it off. 

Reminds me of the famous 'pigeon alerter' from 2012. I wonder if the creator ever got their patent? 

The one below really defies all rational explanation. The only mitigation I can offer is that it was about 5 feet long and drawn on one of those wipeable wall/noticeboards, and is in the office of a Norwegian-based (I think) engineering company in Bristol staffed by some very quirky people, who also produced the 'cake is real' sign. 

Yes, that really does say 'Norwegian Mountain Cat' 

It was probably meant to only have a transient existence back in March, but the office has been closed since then. I wonder if the artist will be surprised to see it still there when this lockdown nonsense finally concludes?

Thursday, October 22, 2020

Funny Covid office signs

 Long time no post (sorry), we have been frantically busy as usual. 

I have a habit of posting funny office signs (example) and the proliferation of one-way systems in offices has been a rich source of humour for me. 

I give you:

Walk this way... but don't.

It's good to have choices.

Both of which need no further elaboration.

Hopefully all this nonsense will be over soon!





Tuesday, August 18, 2020

I still love my scissors!


My trusty scissors and battered leather holster

Those of you with long memories will recall a post six years ago in which I rather bafflingly eulogised about my love for my then fifteen-year-old scissors that I use for maintenance. This post was occasioned by temporarily losing them. I still own and love them, or did until last week...

I thought I had lost them for good at a bar in Bournemouth (while working rather than partying, in case it needs spelling out). Bereft, I went as far as ordering some replacements, but as is the way in the modern world they are not as good as my originals. 

More troublingly it appears impossible to buy a scissor holster, certainly off Amazon; most are just a bit too narrow. 

Then yesterday, while working in our delivery Transit near Basingstoke they miraculously appeared from under the driver's seat, despite me having checked the Transit's interior carefully when I lost them. Oddly I am fairly sure I didn't lose them in the Transit. Still, full of joy as I was I treated my colleagues to coffees as we drove round Hampshire to celebrate my being reunited with my scissors.  

Why the level of love for some cheap florist's scissors? To quote my 2014 eulogy:

"...the combination of a short blade for precision, and a curved blade for strength means they can do what most of my staff need a separate pair of scissors and secateurs for."

Most of my staff carry straight bladed general scissors, which are great for trimming leaves, and secateurs for proper pruning. These do both. 

Anyway, a little consumer advice for you if you are looking for houseplant scissors: this twin pack is the best I have found:

The best I can currently find


Though the handles are rather flimsy and I suspect my pair will outlast them for that reason. The crucial thing to look for when hunting for a pair is that short, curved blade, as it grips what you are trying to cut, rather than sliding off.

But you can't have mine!




Thursday, July 23, 2020

One in, one out (with a Lockdown in-between)

Roger, giving his van a clean-out

My very last act before Stewarts heeded UK Government advice and closed until mid-May was to drive Roger (pictured above) home on the occasion of his retirement. Roger had worked for us since 2005, and for fifteen years prior to that at another firm that Stewarts then bought.
Despite his very sprightly appearance, he was 70 years old, a fact which surprised many of his clients when I told them. He will be greatly missed but is still keeping in touch with me. 

On March 30 his replacement Eleanor was meant to start with us, but that plan went out of the window! In all the chaos that has followed the Lockdown period it has only now been possible to bring her onboard. It takes four weeks to train up a new maintenance technician to a level where we can safely release them in to the wild on their own, so we were simply too busy to do that sooner, so we are very grateful to her for her patience. 

Just to add insult to injury, we made her help with a very arduous installation on her first day. Arduous because it took place in a very hot (30+ deg C) and humid indoor pool area at a five star hotel in the New Forest. While Michelle glowed delicately and I sweated like a pig, Eleanor seemed to positively love it, despite - as is expected now - wearing a facemask, which makes one feel even warmer. 

The plants, by the way are 3m high Caryota Mitis, aka Fishtail Palms. I discovered many years ago that these absolutely love the indoor swimming pool environment; surprisingly almost all other tropical plants don't do very well, for reasons that are quite beyond me. 

I am also a big fan of the pots - 'Polystone' Globes - though the job would have been a lot simpler if they were made properly waterproof... these had to be installed on a very tight time schedule for a promotional photoshoot, then removed to be properly lined... then reinstalled this week. 




Eleanor, rocking the Covid PPE look

Caryota Mitis


Wednesday, July 15, 2020

Some more funny signs


Safety signs at their best
About time I injected some humour in to proceedings with a couple of funny signs seen recently on our clients' premises. I have form for this, for example here.
The one on the left is a very Covid-topical effort in the gents' loos in a very healthy-and-safety-obsessed client near Southampton. The rest of the cubicles had a fairly generic safety sign on; this one on first reading is similar, but gets sillier as you read down. 

The one below is from an office kitchen in Bristol. It really defies any rational description, I can only assume that an original announcement was doctored. It is a very geeky office, so it may be a science joke that goes over my head.

Jonathan




The cake is for real, apparently. 

Friday, June 26, 2020

World's happiest suitcase sighted in Surrey

Look at its happy face!
Just had to post this picture on here:

On the roof terrace of a lovely new building we were installing plants in yesterday (in that heat...) is a suite of garden furniture, the table of which is a suitcase.



Viewed from inside the building it looks like happiest suitcase in the world!

Apart from the temperature, the job itself was very enjoyable, as it was one of those buildings that just looked 'right' with the plants installed.

We don't quite go as far as Richmond in Surrey with our maintenance service but we have a network of trusted regional partners who we reciprocally subcontract the maintenance service to, so I know the plants will be in safe hands. So if you are a national company, we are able to help you.

Jonathan

Some plants in the building
 

Friday, June 12, 2020

Barrier planters (again)

Sansevieria Laurentii in a barrier planter
Now is a very good time to revisit a topic I touched upon three years ago: barrier planters.

There is suddenly a great interest in physically separating office workers' space from each other for some reason I won't relate.

I'm seeing a lot of offices with rather ugly ad hoc screens made of perspex and the like.

I certainly hope as time goes by and a bit more design thought goes in to it, companies will start to look at using planting as a barrier.


Dracaena Lemon Lime in a similar display
There are free-standing 'living wall' available, but I must say I prefer these barrier planters:a traditional floor trough, but a lot higher than normal. They look best planted in a uniform way like these but it's not mandatory. It's also not mandatory to have them in white. As with most of our products they are hand sprayed so can be any colour, matt or gloss that you can imagine. Being bespoke they can be precisely the size you want too. 

The catch is that compared to normal plant pots they are quite expensive initially, but if you rent them they suddenly become a much more affordable proposition. And much better looking than a sheet of perspex!

Jonathan

Has this pot leaked?!?

Sorry it's been so long since my last update; there's been this little pandemic going round which has rather disrupted our business and meant I was furloughed for two months and then spent a month frantically playing catch-up trying to bring our maintenance customers back on board.

It's only when you have to contact all 275 customers in a hurry (as we did on 24 March) that you find out how many obsolete contact email addresses you have.

Anyway, I digress. for the first few weeks after I was 'un-furled' I was madly dashing round as many of our clients as I could getting water on plants that hadn't been touched in two months (most survived just fine by the way). One of the first places I went was an insurance office in Bournemouth (this one), where I was confronted by the sight of a tall yellow planter, surrounded by a large yellow area on the otherwise grey carpet. See my traditionally dodgy photo to the right.

My first instinct was blind panic; one of my yellow pots had leaked its yellow all over the carpet.

On closer examination it appears that the company have - for Heaven knows what reason - decided to replace certain areas of their grey carpet with yellow/grey tiles, but only in patches. This was backed up when I found another area the same.

It's striking I suppose...

Jonathan

Tuesday, February 25, 2020

Well, that was a different job!


Mitch, Julie and I at work
By and large, I try and avoid publishing posts that are just "look at the installation we just did" stories, as I expect to the casual reader they would all become rather samey.

This job we carried out last week in Poole was notable for several key reasons, and certainly quite memorable for all involved.

First it was a private house owned by a Dutch couple, whose other house - amusingly - is very close to where the plants and pots came from in Holland. Most of Stewarts' clients are businesses. In one of the pics you can see the dog, happily snoozing as we work round them.

Second, while we take photos of the finished product, rarely is the client snapping away as we work, meaning we have a great pictorial record of the work.

Lovely weather!

Third, as can be seen in the image to the left of Sandra and I working on the lovely balcony, the weather was somewhat against us!

Fourth, it was a four-storey house with no lift, so everything had to be carried in. For this balcony, the pots, plants and six large bags of compost had to be carried all the way to the top floor.

Fifth, as you can see the pots are very unusual. I go on about how most of our pots are made from fibreglass and painted in the colour of your choice. Not these "Mussel Shell" pots, which are formed from a mosaic of mother-of-pearl pieces glued onto a mould. They look fantastic, and at a not-unexpected price premium.


Sandra poses with her handiwork

Finally, as a consequence of all this complexity, it was a job that involved four of us in two vans, and consequently had a nice 'team effort' feeling to it. Though I think we all agreed we were a tired team at the end.

I put a lot of planning in to making it run smoothly, but it wouldn't have gone as well without the professionalism of Sandra, Mitch and Julie to help me out.

I'll let the rest of the pictures do the talking.

Jonathan





The whole team at the end!
Trying to take a photo in a gale!

The completed rubber plant
One of the floor bowls
 



Monday, February 24, 2020

Soil vs hydro roots, and getting watering right

Very interesting photograph stolen from a Facebook post by Dutch plant supplier Nieuwkoop showing the difference in the root structure of two plants of identical species and size when one is a soil plant and one is a hydroponic plant.

No prize for guessing which is which: hydro plants are grown in LECA clay granules and the secret to the plants' success is keeping the watering as consistent as possible, aided by a floating water level indicator. As you can see, it has fat main roots that have few fine side-roots, and all terminate at the level at which the water should be kept.

This being a Dracaena Marginata, the soil version would be kept fairly dry, hence the healthy profusion of roots in the rootball, all looking for any available moisture.

So what can we learn from this?     

1. As I said above, if you are one of those few people tasked with caring for hydro plants, consistent watering is vital. If you overwater them, this dry-loving plant would constantly have its roots in water, if you underwatered it, it would get none at all.

2. More interesting is that if you dig out a soil plant that has been kept too wet over a long period, its roots will look like hydro roots, i.e. not many of them and not very well branched.

What does this last point mean? Firstly, the plant has a much less healthy root structure (though on the plus side would be a lot easier to dig out of a container), but secondly if you started looking after a plant that someone else had kept too wet and started watering what you thought was correctly, the chances are it would die, as it simply wouldn't be able to take up a restricted diet of water.

So make any changes to an existing plants watering regime over a long period and let it adapt.

Jonathan

Thursday, February 13, 2020

A podcast about us!

For those of you with 45 minutes to kill, back in the Autumn my manager Rebecca and I were interviewed by a long-time-ago former colleague who now makes podcasts on the topic of gardening.

N.B. non-clickable link, see link below!
Link to the podcast on our website

It's a discussion about interior landscaping in general and Stewarts in particular.

I find it very odd listening to my voice (I sound so posh!), and Rebecca can't listen to it at all.

Enjoy!

Jonathan

On Facebook... finally!



First, apologies for the lengthy absence since last posting... once again we have been kept busy by having a technician on long-term sick, so I'm out every day covering her work, or was... welcome back Sandra!

Anyway, at long last Stewarts Interior Landscaping have our own Facebook page!


As we are a small part of the Stewarts Garden Centre chain, we always came under their Facebook umbrella, but we decided that as our audience are rather different we should have our own page.

I am now the editor of said page. I will attempt to update it more regularly than I have managed with this blog.

At the time of writing there is no plan to stop contributing to this blog, fear not!

Jonathan