Tips for vertical gardens

If your wall is going to be outside, choose plants for your climate zone. A subtropical wall will not thrive in Invercargill and little alpine plants won’t like it in the far north. If it’s going to be inside, check the light levels and choose plants accordingly.

Wherever you live, try to choose plants with a wide range of tolerances. Anything that’s picky about how much sun, water and food it gets could be a problem.

Maintenance is vital. When plants have limited access to soil, water and nutrients, you have to be at their beck and call. A week’s holiday is likely to be ruinous. If you can’t water regularly, consider a drip irrigation system.

Think carefully about evergreen, deciduous and semi-deciduous plants. Obviously deciduous plants will lose their leaves in winter but if there’s one you really want, have it, but be prepared to replace it in the winter months.

Wall-to-wall green walls can be enlivened by changes of texture, colour and style in your plants. If your wall is going to be all foliage, mix up soft with spiky, and silver grey plants with dark green or black. Consider creating a motif or some word art.

Check each plant regularly for pests – if you have 10 of one type of plant and one of them gets scale, it’ll share it around. Treat problems quickly so they don’t spread.