Why Painted Plants Are Tacky, Harmful, And Should Be Avoided

Mother Nature has been refining her creations for millennia, and countless unique-looking houseplants in dazzling colors are proof of her handiwork. If luscious, green leaves are too vanilla for you, there's no shortage of plants that show off natural shades beyond green. But a painted plant is a step too far. Enraged Redditors have taken to the platform to express their disgust at exactly this: On shelves of big box stores, dip-dyed and spray-painted potted plants are waiting to come home with you.

Instead of making faux plants look real, this trend has real plants masquerading as fake. Several Reddit threads dedicated to the issue argue against more than the plants' unnatural looks. A good number of Redditors noted how paint is detrimental to the plants' health, and despite the fact that I spent a good portion of my high school biology lessons passing notes, I do now understand why. A thick, impermeable coating on leaves interferes with a handful of processes that keep plants alive, like photosynthesis, respiration, and transpiration. Among the scores of complaints about painted plants, the general sentiment is that plants are beautiful enough on their own and that consumers need to be educated about how painting them negatively affects their growth. As a lifelong plant lover and frequent writer of House Digest gardening articles, I share these commenters' annoyance.

Another lesson I remember from high school is the law of supply and demand. Unnaturally tinted plants are a common sight at stores like Home Depot, Lowe's, and Walmart; if they're for sale, that means there's enough demand to keep stocking them. Although no contributor on Reddit has chimed in with a "Hey, they look great!" so far, some people reported that they own a painted plant just the same. Some had received one as a gift, while others took pity on them and brought them home to "rescue." In many cases, the reluctant painted plant owners claimed that the plant continued to grow with the right care, and that the paint eventually wore away.

However, there's a lot of power in the way you spend your money. If you don't like something or don't agree with it on principle, don't spend your money on it. This is exactly the response many of the pity plant purchasers got on various Reddit threads; if you buy a painted plant, you're contributing to the problem. The store still makes a profit, and its suppliers have an incentive to ship out more painted plants. All in all, if you've got to pick up a brush, try out a stylish flower pot painting idea instead.