Flowering potted plants add a beautiful garden feeling to the indoors any time of year. Many potted flowering houseplants are so familiar in certain seasons, they have become part of the traditional holiday décor. Holiday flowering plants are perfect for gifting or using for decorating through the seasons.
Benefits of potted flowering holiday plants:
- Just like cut flowers, potted flowering plants provide instant color when decorating. Many colors and types are available, so you are sure to find flowers to coordinate with your planned décor.
- Cut bouquets look their best only for a week or so. Potted flowering plants can bloom for weeks, and many can be kept and grown as foliage plants after flowering.
- Potted flowers are a good value, often less expensive than cut bouquets and they are just as pretty. You can group several small pots of potted flowers to create a larger, or multicolored display.
We have information to help you select and care for some of the most popular flowering houseplants through the seasons.
Potted Flowering Holiday Plants for Spring
In most cases potted flowering holiday plants for spring arrive at our florists and garden centers well before plants start sprouting from the ground outdoors. They remind us that spring is right around the corner and potted flowers make terrific gifts or centerpieces for Mother’s Day, Easter, Passover, or St. Patrick’s Day celebrations.
Care Tips for Fabulous Miniature Roses
The elegant beauty of roses can be enjoyed just about anywhere with these miniature versions. Miniature roses are perfect for small garden spaces and grow happily in pots outdoors or in a sunny window. Miniature roses bloom throughout the summer into autumn.
Transplanting Potted Lilies to the Garden
Potted lilies are one of the few flowering holiday plants that can be successfully transplanted into your permanent garden. Follow our tips for transplanting lilies outdoors where you can enjoy them for years to come.
Beyond Basic Care – Potted Flowering Bulbs
Potted tulips, hyacinth, daffodils, and crocus are all popular flowering holiday plants for spring. Learn how to care for potted flowering bulb plants and successfully transfer them to the garden after the flowers fade.
7 Tips to Keep Phalaenopsis Orchids Blooming
The Phalaenopsis orchid (commonly known as a moth orchid) is one of the easiest orchids to grow and a great choice for beginners. Follow these tips to keep your orchid healthy and encourage it to bloom as often and as long as possible.
Other Popular Flowering Holiday Plants for Spring
Hydrangea
Potted hydrangea, with its lush flower clusters and miniature shrub appearance, creates an instant garden feeling that is perfect when decorating for a spring wedding, Easter celebration, or garden party. Once the weather warms up, you can grow your hydrangea outdoors in a patio pot or in the ground.
Primrose
Primroses are one of the most charming spring holiday plants. Small potted primroses are a favorite for gifting and a great way to say “I appreciate you” to friends, family, teachers, or work colleagues.
Florist Azaleas
Potted azaleas are stunning when they’re in full flower, with the blooms often nearly covering the foliage. They’re beautiful in combination with flowering bulbs or hydrangeas to create large spring displays on a buffet table or Easter décor in a church.
Potted Flowering Plants for Summer Décor or Gifting
Summer is all about being outside in the sunshine but that doesn’t mean you can’t bring a little summer indoors as well. Potted flowering plants can be used indoors and out to add color and fragrance to all the spaces where you spend time. A single potted flower can be used as a table centerpiece in a kitchen, dining room or on a patio table. A small plant in your bathroom is a cheerful way to greet the day.
Popular Potted Flowers for Summer Holiday Décor or Gifting
Sunflower
Scientific research has resulted in many dwarf sunflower hybrids that are perfectly sized for growing in pots. They’re long-blooming and can be used indoors or out in any sunny location. One of the most cheerful plants to give as a gift!
Lavender
Potted lavender is wonderful for adding beauty and fragrance to your summer gathering spaces. The faded lavender flowers can be trimmed and dried for use in sachets or potpourri while the fragrant foliage can continue to be enjoyed as a foliage plant.
Kalanchoe
Kalanchoe’s vibrant color selection and easy care has made it a very popular flowering holiday plant that is usually available throughout the year. Kalanchoe will grow happily outdoors during the warm months and can be brought back inside for the winter.
Gerbera Daisy
Cheerful, vibrantly colored, daisy-like blooms have made gerbera daisy one of the most popular potted flowers for summer holidays. Gerbera daisies are perfect for gifting and decorating for special occasions, like summer weddings or family reunions. The individual blooms can last one to two weeks on the plant, then your gerbera daisy may take a short rest before setting another round of flower buds.
Dianthus
Potted dianthus are especially nice for summer holiday table centerpieces where their spicy-scented blooms can be enjoyed. They have a special cottage garden-feel that is perfect when decorating for a summer garden party or outdoor wedding.
Potted Flowering Plants for Fall Décor
While Chrysanthemums are probably the most familiar potted flowering plant for fall decorating, there are lots of other options these days as interest in decorating for the harvest season has grown beyond potted mums and pumpkins. Flowers are a popular choice for Day of the Dead (Día de los Muertos) celebrations as well as Thanksgiving décor.
Chrysanthemums – Care, Color and Varieties
This guide covers all aspects of growing and caring for this popular flowering holiday plant and the different colors and varieties of chrysanthemum that are available.
Get the Most Out of Potted Mums
Potted chrysanthemums are a source of instant color that can be used indoors and out. Learn how to select and care for your potted mum to get the most out of this popular flowering holiday plant.
Decorating with Mums
Chrysanthemum flowers have become as symbolic of the fall season as pumpkins and dried cornstalks. Here are some of our favorite ways to use chrysanthemums for adding great color to seasonal decorations.
Other Popular Flowering Holiday Plants for Fall
Ornamental Cabbage and Kale
Ornamental cabbage and kale are especially popular for growing outdoors in individual pots or in large containers combined with your favorite fall flowers. Their substantial leaves and rich color make a bold statement – perfect for larger fall harvest displays. The blends of white to purple tones in the foliage are a beautiful contrast to the warm oranges and yellows tones of pumpkins, mums, and decorative gourds.
Celosia
The feathery plumes of celosia make a good filler to balance out large displays of pumpkins and gourds. The soft texture and vertical habit of celosia is a nice contrast to the more rounded forms of mums and pumpkins. The long-lasting flowers make celosia a gift plant that can be enjoyed for many weeks.
Ornamental Peppers
By fall ornamental peppers are in their prime, usually loaded with bright red, yellow or orange peppers. Ornamental peppers are beautiful in combination with potted fall holiday plants. Use them to add texture and color to your harvest season display outdoors. A single potted pepper makes a colorful and unexpected centerpiece.
If your style leans more towards elegance in your fall holiday displays, calla lilies are the perfect solution. The sleek lines of the calla plant’s foliage and sculptural quality of the flowers have a modern, luxurious feel. Just the right touch for a fall wedding centerpiece, buffet table, or gift plant.
Potted Flowering Holiday Plants for Winter Décor
There’s a special joy that flowering holiday plants brings to the winter season. While plants outdoors have a rest, you can still enjoy the spirit of warm summer days and garden flowers by decorating with blooming plants indoors. Here are tips for growing some of the more popular potted plants for holidays such as Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Mardi Gras.
Care Tips for Holiday Cyclamen
Cyclamen’s patterned, heart-shaped leaves are so beautiful this plant could be enjoyed for its foliage alone. Learn how to keep winter cyclamen flowers healthy and happy!
How to Grow an Amaryllis Plant
Amaryllis have become as popular as poinsettias and Christmas cacti for living holiday decor. They’re fun to watch grow and their spectacular, trumpet-like flowers are a welcome sight during winter. Learn how to care for your amaryllis and encourage it to rebloom next year.
Care Tips for African Violets
A well-cared-for African violet will bloom throughout the year, even in the winter. Keep your African violet plants healthy and flowering with this helpful list of tips.
Keep a Poinsettia Looking Good Longer
The colorful bracts of a poinsettia can hold their color and beauty for many weeks or even months with proper care. As a result, poinsettias are the most popular flowering holiday plant for the winter season. Keep your poinsettia looking beautiful for as long as possible with these tips.
How to Care for Your Christmas Cactus
Your Christmas cactus makes a great houseplant after it’s lost its holiday blooms. We’ve got tips on how to get the most out of your Christmas cactus throughout the year, including how to encourage it to flower again.
How Do You Wrap a Plant for a Gift?
If you buy a flowering potted plant at a florist there is a good chance that they will prepare your plant for transport by placing it in a protective paper sleeve or paper wrapping. Otherwise, you’ll want to plan ahead by taking along a cardboard box or paper bag to transport your plant. However you choose to contain the plant, consider whether you’ll need some sort of stuffing, such as crumpled paper or packing peanuts, to place around the base of the pot to keep it from toppling over during transit.
Extra care should be taken when transporting potted flowering plants during the winter. Even a short exposure to frigid temperatures can take a toll. Be sure that the plant is well protected when moving it from one location to another, such as from the store to your car to inside your home. In the case of an impulse purchase (so easy to do in the winter when fresh flowers are especially enticing) paper bags will insulate best, but doubling up plastic bags will work as well. Do the best you can to try to cover the entire plant without crushing it and keep the amount of time its exposed to the cold as short as possible.
Potted flowering plants from a florist are usually provided with decorative, waterproof plastic wrapping covering the pot. However, any potted flowering plant can be dressed up to present as a gift, or to create an attractive centerpiece, simply by wrapping the pot with pretty paper, foil, or fabric. You can use ribbon or jute twine to secure the paper round the pot and tie it off with a bow. Consider placing a plant saucer under the pot before wrapping, especially when using materials that are not waterproof and may absorb moisture.
What to Do if You Receive a Flowering Holiday Plant as a Gift
Giving or receiving a flowering plant as a gift is sure to bring smiles all around. Some people will try to keep their plant growing for years to come. It becomes a sentimental reminder of a special day or a thoughtful friend. But others may not have an interest in, or even know how, to keep a plant thriving once the flowers have faded – and that’s okay.
Even with the best care some flowering plants will never again achieve the lush flowering that commercial growers are able to accomplish in the greenhouse. Just like cut flower bouquets, potted flowering plants can be treated as temporary décor to be enjoyed for a while then disposed of when flowering is done. If you have a compost pile or yard waste disposal service, just remove the plant and soil from the pot and toss it in with the compost. Plastic pots can be cleaned of soil and placed in with your plastic recycling.
Flowering holiday plants are especially popular during the winter months when the days turn dreary and cold. Here’s a few more ideas for growing Winter Flowers Indoors and how to care for them. There’s no need to give up beautiful blooms just because the weather turns cold!
