UKC

I'm looking for advice on flowering plants that will do well in pots, in a stairwell. One floor up, floor to ceiling windows facing east and a smaller window to the W. 

Artificial. Some places do very realistic ones.

No thanks. 

How big are the pots and how tall do you envisage the plants to be?  

T.

Orchids, not kidding. Treat them like a not very needy pet and they will flower every few months. When they do it’s wonderful. The more you have the more chance there is of flowers at any point in time. Don’t get the cheap supermarket ones. 

Thanks. 

Annuals or perennials?

For annuals, this is window-box territory. I like petunias (pure colours, esp electric pink, not stripes), fuchsia (lots of exotic flower shapes available) and lobelia, mix of blues and white. All go on for ages, all can be found in trailing varieties. A bit boring, perhaps, but very reliable. Get a restricted palette: I go for blue/pink/white with all of them, i.e. avoid yellow/orange/red.

Streptocarpus and Saintpaulias.  They do really well out of direct sunlight, assuming it isn't too cold and draughty and thrive on moderate neglect.

Thanks for the replies, can anyone recommend a gardening forum where I can ask these kind of questions?

Lobelia is always good value.  Ours have just got to the exploding blue froth stage, which makes for terrific borders; if they could do the same on a stairwell they'd look great.

T.

How much sun/light does the stairwell get?

Hosters do well in shady spots and in a stairwell should get protection from the slimy bastards aka slugs.

Otherwise ferns are also nice in pots in shady spot.

Errrr... Gardeners world...

Google it.

Tenement stairwell or internal non drafty heated stairwell?

If internal, with no drafts, and solar gain then try tomatoes in summer - easy to do as well

Visit the RHS website and try the Find a Plant page. It should give you some good ideas.

I don't have to Google it. What's your experience of it, does it have a good forum, do you recommend it?

Er ... aren't gardening forums there for asking climbing questions?

I can't remember if it has a forum. The Gardeners World website does. As far as the website goes I suggested looking at it because it gives lots of information on just about every plant you can grow in Britain.

Reading your description of the area you want to put plants in I think it sounds good. You should get plenty of Sun in the morning and some in the afternoon. You'll not get any frost so you can plant some exotic stuff, someone suggested orchids earlier which could be good. As you're planting in containers you can use whatever soil suits the plants you choose. Could you plant climbers to make use of the height? Honeysuckle would give a nice scent and clematis will give a spectacular display of flowers in the Summer. Cacti would also be interesting, Christmas cactus produces flowers at Christmas so would give a bit of mid winter colour, plus they're as tough as old boots. I've got one outside on my windowsill and it stays there over the winter. Otherwise think about getting something evergreen or maybe even a dogwood or two which would add some bright red, yellow or green in winter.

The other thing I've tried to do when selecting plants is to make sure you've got something happening for as long as possible. One easy way of doing that is to start with a few plants but when you need a bit of colour have a look around your garden centre for something suitable that's about to flower. Over a few years you'll build up a nice collection that should blend well.