The book is laid out beautifully. The 50 plants are listed by rank based on removal of chemical vapors, ease of maintenance, resistance to insect infestation, and transpiration rate. Each plant gets a two-page spread; one page discusses the plant's ideal environment, sunlight conditions, care, and general information about the plant along with a full photo of it. The next page has a zoomed-in full-page photo of the leaves and/or flowers so the reader gets a feel for what the plant looks like and how it will fit with their decor.The book begins by discussing the research about the air purification qualities of houseplants. The initial chapters explain how air contaminates enter our homes, the adverse effects these toxins have on humans, and how plants remove the contaminates from the air. I was surprised to learn that common household items such as blankets, toys, gas stoves, computers, and carpets can lead to allergies, asthma, even cancer, and that they might contribute to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Once I read how certain plants can remove these dangerous microbes from the air, my husband and I immediately discussed adding these plants to our home.
The author explains in great detail how to care for the plants, which I found very helpful as a novice indoor gardener. The author also details the specific toxins that different plants remove, and indicates whether the plants transpire at night (which is good for a bedroom) or during the day.
This book is an excellent addition to an avid collector's plant library, both for its curiosity value & beautiful coverage of basic houseplants, and doubtless of interest to people concerned about air quality as well. It also provides enough basic information on each plant to be a useful reference for beginning enthusiast, but I would qualify that by saying that newbies will probably want a more broadly based work as their first home reference guide. For people looking for gift books, the pictures & layout are lovely.
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This book not only gives concise, quantitative data about which substances each plants removes from the air, but combines this data with other factors like ease of care and pest resistance to give one overall ranking to each plant. The introduction is fascinating, especially the part about his eco-house which uses plants to clean his water waste as well as the air. However, what I like best about the book is the gorgeous pictures. I have never seen a plant book with such large, glossy pictures of such perfect plants matched with the ideal pot. It's beautiful!Read Best Reviews of How to Grow Fresh Air: 50 House Plants that Purify Your Home or Office Here
PROS:There are many positive aspects of this book nicely shot photos and overviews of many plants, including various rankings for each plant: Removal of Chemical Vapors, Ease of Growth and Maintenance, Resistance to Insect Infestation, Transpiration Rate. It also does a good job explaining why each of these aspects is important.
CONS:
I took off one star for how brief and general the overview and care are while this is a good basic listing of plants, you're going to need another reference for tips on purchasing, planting, placement, etc.
I took off another star for something I find much more important it's probably enough to knock off the two stars on its own. There is NO indication on any of the plant pages as to toxicity. For those of us who have pets and/or children, it is critical to know what in our homes is poisonous. I specifically checked the pages for plants that I know offhand to be toxic Poinsettia and Peace Lilly and neither mentioned anything about it.
This could be a forgivable omission in a general listing of plants, but for a book that claims to "Purify Your Home or Office" it seems unnecessarily reckless.
For example, it recommends the Peace Lilly, saying its "ability to remove indoor air pollutants and its excellent performance in all categories make it a most valuable houseplant," without mentioning that if ingested by pets, it can cause symptoms leading to "convulsions, renal failure, coma and death."
I plan on going through the book, searching online to find out how toxic each listed plant is, and labeling them as such in the book. If you're willing to do this, then the book should be useful to you.
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The photos are simple, beautiful, and informative. The information for each plant is really helpful, and it's nice to have a chart of which toxins come from which sources. I really enjoyed seeing the different plants and picking a good one for our house (although it was hard for me to track one down and I actually ended up buying seeds for it--I hope they'll grow!). The book is organized pretty intuitively, although navigation might take a little longer if you want to find a particular plant (since they're in order of overall rating rather than alphabetical order, you'd have to either use the index or flip for a while).The only reason I didn't give the book five stars is that I would make an addition to each individual page with a plant on it: I'd list information about whether the plant is poisonous to humans and their pets. For people who have young children, cats, dogs, and/or other animals in the house (or the clinic, or wherever the plants will be placed), this is an important consideration.
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