Bahama Times

Thursday, Mar 28, 2024

'They're in Charge': Plants Thrive in a Tom Ford Perfume Bottle in This Hawaii Home

'They're in Charge': Plants Thrive in a Tom Ford Perfume Bottle in This Hawaii Home

Courtney Monahan of Paiko in Honolulu shows us how to up our greenery game.

When one thinks of indoor plant styling and Hawaii, a lush, jungle vibe might spring to mind. Instead, Courtney Monahan, the owner of Paiko, a plant store in Honolulu, incorporates island style but tempers it with eclectic and vintage pieces—with a good dose of grandma thrown in.

“I like clean lines but a lot of my things are grandma-y,” she says. “The furniture is my grandma’s, the chair belonged to my friend’s grandma.” As a result, her home is filled with pretty, fresh moments that are ripe for inspiration.

But indoor plant styling is more than just picking a plant and plopping it down wherever you want it—you gotta be flexible. “If your plant doesn’t like where you put it, you gotta try someplace else,” Monahan says. “With plants, they’re in charge. They tell you where they want to be.”

Monahan’s home, meanwhile, serves as a living reminder of what her customers are trying to achieve. “My desk is alive with plants because they lift my mood, and remind me when I’m working and sending emails why I own Paiko—it’s so other people can have the knowledge it takes to own plants,” Monahan says. “Everyone who comes into my house says they love it, and I try to remember that this is what the customers want, too.”

Courtney Monahan at her home in Manoa. The varying heights and hues of a ric rac cactus, a bamboo palm, and a cobra fern under the desk add depth to the room.


Indoor Plant Style Tip No. 1: Botanical Prints Play Well with Plants
Oncidium orchids and botanical prints draw the eye, but so does Monahan’s rattan and leather bag from Miuccia Studio. “Even the TSA lady at the airport wanted to know where I got it,” she says.

Monahan’s bedroom wall features a collection of vintage botanical prints that lift the plant theme onto the wall. (One was a gift, one is from a local Hawaii art show, one a garage sale score.) A vase is filled with oncidium orchids along with peperomia cuttings from her yard, while a fiddle-leaf fig and baby-mounted staghorn fern complete the look.

She’s not afraid to be a little sentimental, either. Dried leis play up the tropical theme. (“When someone picked 300 flowers and then delicately strung them, it’s something you save,” she says.)

Indoor Plant Style Tip No. 2: Put Plants Where They’ll Be Happy (Even If It’s a Perfume Bottle)
Spanish Moss, which some Hawaiians call “Pele’s Hair,” adds botanical drama to a light and airy bathroom.

Monahan hung Pele’s Hair, which we mainlanders call Spanish moss, over her showerhead, where the light is perfect. “With a plant like this, the light and airflow are important,” she says. Since she lives in a humid valley, she doesn’t have to water it, but in a drier climate, she recommends getting the entire plant wet a couple of times a week.

Plants are arranged in a composed display on the bathroom shelves: A spotted begonia cutting is growing happily in “the Tom Ford perfume bottle that I will never get rid of,” Monahan says. A Pilea peperomioides, or Chinese money plant, sits in a hand-painted pot by a local artist. Moa—a native plant that was used medicinally by early Hawaiians, and also in a wishbone-like game that involves squawking like a chicken—peeks out from a vase.

Indoor Plant Style No. 3: Repeat the Pot, Not the Plant
A turntable gets a new spin with monochromatic white pots filled with plants in various textures and sizes.

To create a display around her sideboard and record player, Monahan used white containers in varying heights. “The monochrome pots help you see the plants and lead to moments where your eyes can rest on the greenery,” she says. Meanwhile, baskets and a wooden sideboard add warm contrast.

For this look, Monahan recommends using different plants with varying textures, rather than repeating the same few plants over and over. (This display alone includes seven different plant species.) A Philodendron narrow keeps the eye moving with its jagged leaves, an African spear plant (Sansevieria cylindrica) is cylindrical and to the point, while Hoya obovata and Hoya kerrii spill out of baskets mounted on the ceiling.

Indoor Plant Style Tip No. 4: Indoor Plant Styling Takes Patience
Monahan’s store, Paiko in Honolulu, is named after the area on the island where she grew up.

While it would be nice to think one could just walk into a plant store and walk out with Monahan’s well-styled home, she reminds us that plants require patience, as does building a meaningful collection. “I think the biggest thing with home design and plants is it takes time,” she says. “The fun is seeing how they grow into the space.”

Newsletter

Related Articles

Bahama Times
0:00
0:00
Close
Paper straws found to contain long-lasting and potentially toxic chemicals - study
FTX's Bankman-Fried headed for jail after judge revokes bail
Blackrock gets half a trillion dollar deal to rebuild Ukraine
Israel: Unprecedented Civil Disobedience Looms as IDF Reservists Protest Judiciary Reform
America's First New Nuclear Reactor in Nearly Seven Years Begins Operations
Southeast Asia moves closer to economic unity with new regional payments system
Today Hunter Biden’s best friend and business associate, Devon Archer, testified that Joe Biden met in Georgetown with Russian Moscow Mayor's Wife Yelena Baturina who later paid Hunter Biden $3.5 million in so called “consulting fees”
Singapore Carries Out First Execution of a Woman in Two Decades Amid Capital Punishment Debate
Google testing journalism AI. We are doing it already 2 years, and without Google biased propoganda and manipulated censorship
Unlike illegal imigrants coming by boats - US Citizens Will Need Visa To Travel To Europe in 2024
Musk announces Twitter name and logo change to X.com
The politician and the journalist lost control and started fighting on live broadcast.
The future of sports
Unveiling the Black Hole: The Mysterious Fate of EU's Aid to Ukraine
Farewell to a Music Titan: Tony Bennett, Renowned Jazz and Pop Vocalist, Passes Away at 96
Alarming Behavior Among Florida's Sharks Raises Concerns Over Possible Cocaine Exposure
Transgender Exclusion in Miss Italy Stirs Controversy Amidst Changing Global Beauty Pageant Landscape
Joe Biden admitted, in his own words, that he delivered what he promised in exchange for the $10 million bribe he received from the Ukraine Oil Company.
TikTok Takes On Spotify And Apple, Launches Own Music Service
Global Trend: Using Anti-Fake News Laws as Censorship Tools - A Deep Dive into Tunisia's Scenario
Arresting Putin During South African Visit Would Equate to War Declaration, Asserts President Ramaphosa
Hacktivist Collective Anonymous Launches 'Project Disclosure' to Unearth Information on UFOs and ETIs
Typo sends millions of US military emails to Russian ally Mali
Server Arrested For Theft After Refusing To Pay A Table's $100 Restaurant Bill When They Dined & Dashed
The Changing Face of Europe: How Mass Migration is Reshaping the Political Landscape
China Urges EU to Clarify Strategic Partnership Amid Trade Tensions
Europe is boiling: Extreme Weather Conditions Prevail Across the Continent
The Last Pour: Anchor Brewing, America's Pioneer Craft Brewer, Closes After 127 Years
Democracy not: EU's Digital Commissioner Considers Shutting Down Social Media Platforms Amid Social Unrest
Sarah Silverman and Renowned Authors Lodge Copyright Infringement Case Against OpenAI and Meta
Italian Court's Controversial Ruling on Sexual Harassment Ignites Uproar
Why Do Tech Executives Support Kennedy Jr.?
The New York Times Announces Closure of its Sports Section in Favor of The Athletic
BBC Anchor Huw Edwards Hospitalized Amid Child Sex Abuse Allegations, Family Confirms
Florida Attorney General requests Meta CEO's testimony on company's platforms' alleged facilitation of illicit activities
The Distorted Mirror of actual approval ratings: Examining the True Threat to Democracy Beyond the Persona of Putin
40,000 child slaves in Congo are forced to work in cobalt mines so we can drive electric cars.
BBC Personalities Rebuke Accusations Amidst Scandal Involving Teen Exploitation
A Swift Disappointment: Why Is Taylor Swift Bypassing Canada on Her Global Tour?
Historic Moment: Edgars Rinkevics, EU's First Openly Gay Head of State, Takes Office as Latvia's President
Bye bye democracy, human rights, freedom: French Cops Can Now Secretly Activate Phone Cameras, Microphones And GPS To Spy On Citizens
The Poor Man With Money, Mark Zuckerberg, Unveils Twitter Replica with Heavy-Handed Censorship: A New Low in Innovation?
Unilever Plummets in a $2.5 Billion Free Fall, to begin with: A Reckoning for Misuse of Corporate Power Against National Interest
Beyond the Blame Game: The Need for Nuanced Perspectives on America's Complex Reality
Twitter Targets Meta: A Tangle of Trade Secrets and Copycat Culture
The Double-Edged Sword of AI: AI is linked to layoffs in industry that created it
US Sanctions on China's Chip Industry Backfire, Prompting Self-Inflicted Blowback
Meta Copy Twitter with New App, Threads
The New French Revolution
BlackRock Bitcoin ETF Application Refiled, Naming Coinbase as ‘Surveillance-Sharing’ Partner
×