Creating contemporary indoor planting with Alys Dobbie

Ref: S1D34090

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About this course

Guided by Alys, learn about the wondrously varied way that you can make architecturally stunning indoor garden creations designed to stay inside your home. You will make an open terrarium, learn about re-potting, propagating and house plant care, as well as create your own wall-mounted stag horn fern display.

Course Description

Alys Dobbie is the owner of two indoor plant shops in Brighton and Hove, and she specialises in creating courses based on indoor planting. This course is for anyone who loves outdoor gardening but doesn’t know how to transfer their skills to the indoors, or if you just want to learn different techniques about how to maximise the planting of your house plants, then this is the course for you.

During the day, you will be guided through the following:

Wall-mounted epiphyte workshop

During this section of the day, you will learn all about epiphytes, their properties and how they are a great addition to any house or garden. You will learn the techniques of wrapping in moss, attaching to a plinth and detailed care instructions. The plants used will be large specimens of stag horn ferns, which everyone will be able to take home with them.

Open terrarium workshop

Open terrariums are small art forms based on landscaping and creating the right substrates to house your cacti and succulents. During this section of the day, you will be walked through making your own cactus soil, different substrates we use in each of the layers of the terrarium and finally landscaping and planting.

Repotting, propagating and house plant care

Plant care is one of the most asked questions in a house plant shop, and how to re-pot, what time of year and what types of soil are other elements of repotting, which will be covered during this portion of the day. Alys invites you to bring up to three or four plants from home into the workshop for re-potting, or, if you don’t have any, Alys will bring some to practise on. Moss poles and larger nursery pots will be available to purchase on the day – alternatively, again, you can bring your own or bring other simple stakes like bamboo. Alys will also bring along a large selection of house plants for everyone to take cuttings from, as well as talking through the wildly different methods there are for propagation. Regarding house plant care, there are various different methods of how to look after your plants, succulents and cacti, which will all be demonstrated and explained.

Course Materials

Included

All materials, apart from additional nursery pots and moss poles, will be included in the price of this workshop.

What students need to bring

  • Secateurs, if you have them
  • An apron (and gardening gloves if you feel you need them)
  • Notepad and pen
  • Up to 3 or 4 house plants from home for repotting if you wish

Available to buy

Available from tutor: Additional nursery pots and moss poles, if required

Additional information

Please wear appropriate clothing/aprons for the workshop or studio, this includes stout covered footwear (no sandals or open toes).

Timetable

Timetable for one day courses

Students should arrive by 9am for registration.

Classes are from 9.15 - 5pm

Lunch is included.

General Information

Tutors

Alys Dobbie portrait

Alys Dobbie

Alys Dobbie is a florist by training and lives in Brighton. She is the owner of one of the littlest plant shops, but with the biggest ideas! Alys and her team create bespoke plant installations for shops, restaurants and clients but specialise in workshops for any number of people from 1 to 100. 

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