While bulbs are widely used in landscapes nationwide, they’re also a favorite for interior decorating, thanks to their cheerful, bright colors, classic forms and striking foliage. Bringing bulbs indoors when they’re in season is easy if you have a bulb-filled cutting garden. Or you can force bulbs to flower – coax them into bloom at times other than their usual habit would permit – during the winter and early spring, making their welcome hues and exquisite fragrance a vivid antidote to winter’s gray skies and snow-bearing winds. Whether cut for a vase or planted in a container, blooming bulbs make the perfect interior accent.
Can springtime be far behind when melting snow is the backdrop for colorful indoor bulbs? Here, paper white narcissus and tropical florist’s amaryllis have been forced to flower months before their customary bloom season.
Photo Credit: ©2002 Dolezal Publishing/Donna Krischan
Container plantings growing in an indoor garden can be a simple but elegant pairing of white tulips and lily-of-the-valley.
Photo Credit: ©2002 Dolezal Publishing/John M. Rickard
Create an island of vibrant color on a rustic indoor plant stand.
Photo Credit: ©2002 Dolezal Publishing/John M. Rickard
Spruce up a cozy nook in your kitchen with a forced hyacinth. (These plants are quick to flower after planting, provided you allow them to develop roots and shoots before moving them to the light.)
Photo Credit: ©2002 Dolezal Publishing/John M. Rickard
Add to festive holiday decorations by including red tulips in a sculptural container to your other decorative touches.
Photo Credit: ©2002 Dolezal Publishing/John M. Rickard
Bulbs are well-suited to modern, as well as traditional décor. Forced paper whites, growing in water and smooth polished stones, suit the most elegant cut-crystal vase. Dainty corydalis can create feathery, fernlike accents to contrast with a favorite Japanese bonsai sculpture in a miniature setting or to soften the stark beauty of Danish teak and cherry.
As a floral accent focus, massed spires of gladiolus and iris are tall, bright and arresting. Scale your efforts to a smaller table by forcing grape hyacinth in a shallow container, or take advantage of rising steps to coordinate blooms at each level. Frame picture window views of the outdoors – and give your neighbors a treat – by placing matched vases of cut tulips and pussywillows to each side of its center.
There’s a place for blooming bulbs in every room. A sewing nook brightens when you add a tuberous begonia above in a hanging planter. Bathroom counters and the humid regions near showers are perfect for fragrant tropical evergreen bulbs like perennial ginger. And what sunny kitchen window wouldn’t welcome the morning happily with a blooming crocus?
You have many types of bulbs from which to choose for indoor displays, each with its own attributes. Most popular are spring bloomers that flower in the short days of winter. Many cold-hardy bulbs can be forced, creating color-filled containers that bolster the spirit.
Most spring bulbs are suitable for forcing in winter, including crocus, daffodil, freesia, grape hyacinth, hyacinth, narcissus and tulip. More rarely seen spring bulbs round out this group, like bluebell, lily-of-the-valley, snowdrop, snowflake, starflower, trillium and the lovely shamrocklike wood sorrel.
Many summer- and autumn-blooming bulbs also are used as houseplants. They’re widely planted because some of their species bloom in repeated waves, interwoven with periods of relative dormancy. Some examples are autumn crocus, cyclamen, miniature dahlia, gloxinia, summer hyacinth, lily, dwarf lily-of-the-Nile, Mexican tuberose and windflower.
Forced spring and summer bulbs are cured, stored, chilled, planted in soil or over water, and allowed to develop abundant roots and green shoots before they’re moved to a bright, indoor location with normal room temperatures during the day and to a cool, 55-60 degree F location at night. The total time needed is typically 6-16 weeks from chill until flowers open.
Tropical bulbs and evergreen species are good choices for year-round indoor enjoyment. They include colorful foliage plants, as well as those loved for their flowers. Amaryllis, tuberous begonia, caladium, florists’ cyclamen, perennial ginger, Amazon lily, orchid pansy and squill are just a few examples. Provide these plants with warmth, ample sunlight and, for some species, moisture and humidity similar to that found in their native regions.
Tropicals tend to bloom in repeated cycles, while tender evergreens usually have only one bloom cycle per season of growth and dormancy. Divide them between flowerings whenever they become crowded or roots begin to emerge from their containers.
Every room of your home will be more welcoming with a burst of blooming bulbs decorating it. Bulbs are ideal for household use because many adapt well to container living. By planting a series of pots over a span of several weeks in autumn, you can have flowers all winter long. Plan for a storage space to keep the bulbs before and after they bloom. Consider how the scale of your bulb planting relates to your room, table or shelf – for example, a cozy corner near a window, while ideal for flat containers filled with diminutive crocus, would cramp a pot containing a dozen large tulips.
As you begin to plan for indoor bulbs, select varieties that are compatible with the color scheme of the rooms where you’ll place them. Bulbs tend to bloom into bright colors (although there are some that offer muted pastels and white flowers). Whatever your color scheme and whatever your bulbs of choice, choose locations that receive full sun when your flowers are on display.
