Rosie Yee on Nurturing Healthy Houseplants: An Interview and Photo Session
Interview with Rosie yee
Rosie a botanist, naturalist, writer and educator helping plant lovers to grow happy, healthy houseplants. I provide advice on natural, easy, no fuss plant care so your plants can thrive and be at the centre of your indoor experience.
I photographed Rosie for Kate Flood’s Compost Coach book late last year. I fell in love with her beautifully styled house full of indoor plants and vintage treasures and wanted to find out a little more about her.
q&a with Botanical rosie
how did your plant obsession start?
I grew up with plants around me, both my parents had a love of nature and there was always plants inside the house. I remember when I was about 10 yrs old begging my parent to let me dig up the lawn and plant a flower/herb garden. But it was years later that my obsession really solidified when I went to uni to study Botany and discovered that the best way to have an established garden when you are renting and constantly moving house is to have a potted indoor jungle.
Image - Rosie, tending to her indoor plant collection (image from Compost Coach Book)
What is the most interesting/risky/crazy cutting you’ve managed to ‘borrow’.
The most wonderful cutting I ‘borrowed’ was from an enormous old Philodendron hybrid growing at a nursery. I didn’t steal it, I plucked up the courage to ask the owner if I could take a cutting and he happily whipped out his secateurs and snipped away. I still have it and it has grown from a two leaf cutting to a 1.5 metre tall plant. It’s gorgeous, the leaves are 30cm long.
What is the best type of plant to gift someone - easy-ish to care for but also special?
One of the easiest houseplants is Epipremnum aureum, commonly known as Devil’s Ivy or Pothos. It is fast growing, hardy and loves the soil to dry out completely between waterings, which is good for busy plant parents. When it needs watering the leaves will give you a sign, they will droop and curl. There are lots of varieties and some of the variegated ones are particularly beautiful and fancy e.g. 'Snow Queen’, 'Marble Queen’ and ‘Manjula
Favourite plant accounts on insta or blogs?
One of my fave plant IG is Atelir TE. They are based in Indonesia on the island of Java and make the most interesting and beautiful Tamandama. Tamandama means multiply plants growing in a ball of moss. It’s an Indonesian concept inspired by the Japanese Kokedama which translates to moss ball. They are living pieces of art - sculptural, textured, colourful, mesmerising.
Image - Rosie & Kate making homemade potting mix for indoor plants (image from Compost Coach Book)
Image - Rosie, tending to her indoor plant collection (image from Compost Coach Book) inside her boho style house.
Favourite plant book (one that you don’t have to know Latin to understand, ha!).
Oh I so many…. a classic must have houseplant bible is the 'Reader’s Digest Complete Guide to Indoor Plants’. It’s Australian and from the 80s so some of the plant names have changed but it’s still a valuable resource and you can usually always find it at the op shop. The other book I love is ‘Tree: a life story’ by David Suzuki and Wayne Grady. It’s written as a biography on an ancient Douglas-fir tree from seed to maturity to death and all of the ecological interactions it has with hundreds of other organisms in the forest. It’s a life changing book, you’ll never look at a tree the same way again.
Image - Rosie, tending to her indoor plant collection (image from Compost Coach Book)
