Episode 401: Baylor Chapman and her new book Decorating with Plants and our State Focus: Louisiana

Baylor Chapman of Lila B. Design (c) Paige Green

Today’s guest is a long-time friend of mine and of the Slow Flowers Movement. I told this story in 2014 when I introduced you to Baylor Chapman in Episode 125. She and I originally met in the fall of 2010 when I was visiting San Francisco to give a lecture for the Garden Conservancy. We were introduced by a mutual friend, landscape designer and garden writer Susan Morrison, who told me: “You need to meet my friend Baylor when you’re in town. She’s into locally-grown flowers just like you are.”

That led to a wonderful visit to tour Baylor’s

former “loading dock” studio in San Francisco’s Mission District. Susan

and Rebecca Sweet, another fellow garden designer and blogger, met me at

Baylor’s. The three of us had lots of fun drooling over Baylor’s floral

creations and learning more about her design philosophy based on seasonal and

locally-grown floral elements. 

Baylor in the pages of The 50 Mile Bouquet (with photography by David Perry)

Baylor is the creator and owner of Lila B. Design, a San Francisco-based design studio. Her creative path is well documented in the pages of The 50 Mile Bouquet where we featured her in a chapter entitled “The Accidental Flower Farmer.”

Writing, teaching and consulting about designing with plants has occupied a good part of this creative woman’s life for the past five-plus years. She hasn’t completely shifted from growing and designing with cut flowers, but she has found a special place in the living plant world, an important and growing niche in the floral marketplace.

Today she is described as an author, plant designer, botanical strategist and promoter of all things green. In 2014,  Baylor produced and wrote The Plant Recipe Book: 100 Living Arrangements for Any Home in Any Season (Artisan Books, 2014), with photography by Paige Green. 

Last month she released a new title: Decorating with Plants, also published by Artisan Books, with photography by Aubrie Pick.

Decorating with Plants

Here’s a bit more about Decorating with Plants:

In Decorating with Plants, Baylor Chapman walks readers through everything they need to know to bring houseplants into their home.

First, there’s Plant

Care 101: from how to assess light conditions to tricks for keeping your plants

alive while on vacation, Baylor gives readers the simple, foundational info

they need to ensure their plants will thrive.

Then she introduces the

reader to 28 of her favorites—specimens that are tough as nails but

oh-so-stylish, from the eye-catching Rubber Tree to the delicate Cape Primrose.

Finally, she guides readers through the home room by room: Place an aromatic plant like jasmine or gardenia to your entry to establish your home’s “signature scent.”

Add a proper sense of scale to your living room with a ceiling-grazing palm. Create a living centerpiece of jewel-toned succulents for a dining table arrangement that will last long after your dinner party.

From air purification to pest control, there’s no limit to what houseplants can do for your home—and Decorating with Plants is here to show you how to add them to spaces big and small with style.

From "Decorating with Plants"

Here’s a bit more about Baylor Chapman, excerpted from the

Lila B. Design “about” page:

Baylor writes: Every day I am inspired by the raw beauty

of nature, and constantly think about ways of how to bring it into my home —<...