Houseplant Encyclopedia

A tough Hoya with thick, rounded glossy leaves and clusters of fragrant cream flowers with red centres. The variegated selection 'Lisa' is widely sold.

A vine plant with thick leaves and waxy star-shaped flowers. Also known as Wax Plant.

A hoya with distinctive thick heart-shaped leaves. Also popular as Valentine's Day gift.

A Philippine Hoya with long, fleshy leaves speckled silver. Its flowers are showiest and most fragrant at night, and appear on a Philippine coin.

The classic indoor palm, spreading arching feather-shaped leaves from a single trunk. Native only to Lord Howe Island, Australia, it copes well with low light, dry air and other indoor hardships.

A large philodendron that spreads big, glossy, deeply lobed leaves from a thick trunk. Old leaf scars remain on the trunk like eyes, and stout aerial roots grow down from it. In pots it reaches 1.2-3 m.

A clumping palm with slender, bamboo-like stems wrapped in dark brown fibre, bearing deeply divided, fan-shaped leaves. Shade tolerant, it is grown in many green and variegated forms.

A dracaena with bamboo-like jointed green stems and narrow leaves that can grow in water alone. Sold as 'lucky bamboo', it is not related to true bamboo.

An epiphyte whose slender stems are densely lined with pairs of small, stiff, succulent heart-shaped leaves. Sold as 'Million Hearts', it is grown trailing from hanging pots.

A lucky houseplant with braided trunk and palm-like leaves. An office staple.

The most widely grown Alocasia in Japan, holding large oval leaves up on thick petioles. Its rod-like rhizome creeping along the soil surface is the key difference from look-alike taro. The whole plant is poisonous.

A staghorn fern with rounded, uncut shield fronds and broad, almost hairless dark green fertile fronds that rise at an angle. The fertile fronds fork only in the outer third, giving a broad paddle-like look.

A small palm with fine, feathery leaves on slender green stems. It copes well with dim light and dry indoor air, and is sold in sizes from mini pots to table plants.

A shade-tolerant plant with beautiful white spathe flowers. Famous from NASA's air purification research.

A trailing heartleaf philodendron whose entire heart-shaped leaves are bright lemon-yellow to lime green. The colour is in the whole leaf rather than in patches.

A trailing heartleaf philodendron whose deep green leaves carry a central stripe of yellow to light green. The variegation sits in the middle of the leaf while the margins stay dark green.