Posts Tagged ‘Room’
If you are gardening indoors, you know that your plants need water, food and light to flourish. Because sunlight is not acquirable indoors, indoor gardeners have to wage a light source for their plants and they do this with grow lights. If you are using HID lights, or high intensity discharge lights, one of the side effects that you will notice is that the light bulbs will heat up with use. If you have several grow lights in your indoor garden, as would commonly be found in a greenhouse setting, all of those lights are creating a tremendous amount of heat. While some heat is good for plants, an excess of heat can kill them very rapidly, and so greenhouse growers and other indoor gardeners will need some type of grow room ventilation system, so the excess heat is fatigued outside.
A key component in any grow room ventilation setup are the grow room fans. Fantech Fans is a top manufacturer of grow room fans, and they offer several favourite models, including duct fans and inline fans. Fantech fans are prefabricated from galvanized steel and come with ball bearings that are permanently sealed. You can fully control the speed, and they make the connection simple for you because the wiring on their grow room fans is external. The grow room fans come in six-inch, eight-inch, ten- and twelve-inch sizes, and a speed control unit is also available.
In addition to grow room fans, there are other parts that you will need to complete your grow room ventilation setup. While the fans are used to move the air around the greenhouse, you will also need a couple of exhaust fans to enable your grow room ventilation to remove stale air from indoors to outdoors. Duct pipe is also used to move air where you want it to go, and this comes in flexible varieties so that it is simple to work with.
Because you are watering plants in an indoor environment, often on impermeable surfaces, plants can also be exposed to too much moisture in an indoor gardening setting. This is not good, because plants can develop fungal diseases if they are exposed to too much water in the region for an extended period of time. Your grow room ventilation will help to keep good air circulation in the gardening room, so that the water does not have time to sit on the plants’ leaves for long, thereby helping to prevent these types of plant problems.
You can learn more about ventilation systems for grow rooms by visiting an online discount gardening supplier.
Browse through 1000′s of FREE gardening articles and videos
http://www.ultimategreenthumb.com
Today, when building costs make massive houses prohibitive, one way to extend your home is to use your outdoor space to full advantage. And many contemporary houses make many a room look larger by visually extending it into the lawn or garden.
Tricks such as glass walls, using the same surround material inside as for a continuing surround on the terrace and using the same material for the ceiling inside as on the extended terrace eaves, help to do this.
Your living room or dining room and even your bedroom or your children’s bedrooms can flow right outdoors on to “floating” decks of wood, bricked terraces or lattice-roofed loggias.
However you do it, with the aid of vine, fences, shrubbery, shade trees and flowers you can make your terrace a delightful place for entertaining, sun-bathing and relaxing.
With a barbecue another dimension is added, for with your own fireplace or barbecue any terrace, lawn or garden spot can offer the blithe enchantments of dining under sun and stars.
In planning your terrace, think about installing an electric outlet for lighting, portable radio, electric spit for your barbecue, etc.
Use vines for a lattice roof (grape vines, for instance, leaf out late when shade is wanted and drop their leaves primeval at the beginning of cool weather, giving delicious fruit as bonus).
Choose a rapid-growing vine like grape, hyacinth or the gourd vine.
Relate your terrace to the rest of your grounds with flowers and vines grown in pots, baskets and tubs. If the surround of the home next to your terrace seems bare or the profile of your cement or asphalt paving seems too sharp in contrast against the grass, soften the line with pots of plants.
Have dwarf trees on your terrace and blossoming shrubs in the terrace-retaining walls. Create interest with changes of level; build flower beds around trees, steps and walls.
For a terrace where everybody in the family assembles, have play space for young children, a sand box which can later be filled with plants, or a tiny square pool for afloat small boats (this can create a sense of luxury long after the kids are grown up).
You need not rely on trees alone for shade. Construct a self-bracing terrace roof in an egg-crate design, using the side of your home and wood, masonry or metal pillars. Corrugated plastic and reinforced glass is in frequent use nowadays because they are watertight, yet let the sunlight through.
Coming into more and more architectural use — particularly in hot climates—is the “parasol” roof, extending from the walls of the home some 4 feet and even more to give pleasant shade to the surrounding area.
Since glare reflected on bare grounds is a source of heat, a carpet of shaded grass under the parasol roof helps to keep the home cool.
Often an outdoor living space gets twice the use if it is prefabricated more accessible. A window in a living room can be converted to a French door, making it more natural to step right out on the terrace instead of travel around the home to reach it.
A terrace that is an extension of a narrow porch—a paved area adjoining the porch—will make the porch that much more liveable. A flagstone path—or any other path— leading to a terrace away from the home will increase the usefulness of the terrace.
Some kind of hard flooring is of prime importance, whether it is of brick, crushed rock, cement, wood block, or flagstone, for it makes it easier to move the furniture around and eliminates worries over tramped-on turf. In fact, it is a good intent to have a terrace in a spot where you are having trouble with the lawn.
Outdoor living space is successful, too, when it is sheltered—away from street noises and traffic, from the neighbours, from the wind. An unused corner of the home or the garage, with the aid of fences and walls, can turn into a sun trap that will stretch out the season for outdoor living both in spring and fall.
A louvered board fence, a basket-weave fence, asbestos ordered in cement to form a modern wall, or the traditional brick wall, all are pleasant backgrounds for planting and good screens against wind and other disturbing elements.
Spring is on its way … the birds are tweeting, blossom buds are starting to bloom… its time to begin planning for a beautiful Summer of long balmy evenings spent outside in the extra room that is your garden. Except it looks more like a concrete jungle than an urban oasis. That’s if you’re anything like me and your other career is a plant assassin. So here is a swift guide to using easy tricks and great new products like wall stickers to create a desirable space on a budget.
It helps to think of the space as you would a room in the house. So before you look at the finishing touches you need to think about the walls and the floor covering. Fences can be be painted with special treatments acquirable at any DIY store. There are beautiful colours acquirable now. A candy – striped fence can look very beautiful and reminds me of beach huts. If you have an unsightly concrete surround this would look great rendered and painted. you might need a plasterer for the rendering but the effect will be really crisp and modern. For the flooring take a look at all the astonishing decorative aggregates available. The beauty of these finishes is that no skilled have is required – simply shovel it all over! Personally I love the dark slates that give a groovy modern look to any space. Or if you like a beach theme then there are lovely Norfolk pebbles.
Clear away all the beds of weeds and exhausted looking plants. Only keep those that you really like. Think of adding low maintenance plants. A individualized favorite of mine is Bamboo. I have found it nearly impossible to kill, it is evergreen and it makes a beautiful sound when it rustles in the wind. I particularly like the black cane variety as it looks very dramatic. Eucalyptus is another evergreen that looks great in an urban space.
I would select some modular dark cane furniture with white cushions to compliment a contemporary Asian theme. For a more Parisian aesthetic there are pretty coloured metal chairs and tables. For a beach feel you could select stripey deck chairs and a hammock. Don’t forget the lighting. There are some beautiful options acquirable now and many are solar powered so need no complicated electrics; pretty asian lanterns and twinkly evenhandedly lights to study but a few.
Once the basics have been sorted out it is time to begin having fun. Wall stickers have been written about a lot lately but few people seem to realize that they can be used outdoors as well as inside. They are guaranteed for five years but in my experience they last much longer. Made from self-adhesive vinyl they are the same product that is used for exterior shop signs and I have had one outside my shop for 15 years and it is still in good condition! There are some great graphics for the garden. You could add a Balustrade to a plain wall. There are beautiful Asian inspired blossoms and trees that would work really well with the dark slate aggregates. For a tiny urban garden you could use a trompe l’eouil of Parisian rooftops – trees chic! They are extremely good value and they will transform your new space into a groovy extra room for those long summer nights. Now after all that hard work, pour yourself a well deserved glass of wine and enjoy.
For more information about Wall Stickers , please visit Zazous.co.uk