How to Grow Fresh Air: 50 Houseplants That Purify Your Home or Office

Ingram

Plants are the lungs of the earth. This revolutionary guide, based on 25 years of research by NASA, shows how common houseplants can combat sick building syndrome and cleanse the home or office of common pollutants. Color photos and llustrations. Online promo.

Customer Reviews

Reviewer: Kim Gilmour from Hamilton, ON, CANADA
I have been looking for information on purifying plants for a while now. Through Amazon, I discovered this book and have added it to my library. As a country girl, living in a 30-yr. old apartment in an industrial city has caused my asthmatic/allergy-prone lungs to struggle a little. This book spells out the sources of dangerous chemical vapors, and specifies plants and plant species which not only reduce these toxins, but beautify your home. My apartment is small, so this book helped me tremendously in choosing plants that are purifying and humidifying, while advising me on ease-of-care and pest control. Strongly recommended for those with environmental concerns. Few Houseplant books refer to this element of indoor gardening.

Reviewer: vera_lynn from Southeastern Virginia
This is a beautifully put-together book focusing on a unique aspect of plant ownership. Entries include both a full-on picture of a healthy, attractively potted specimen, plus a close-up detail of leaves and/or flowers. Descriptions of plant care are concise, well organized and accompanied by a more generalized description of the plant and particulars. Each plant is rated on four characteristics (removal of chemical vapors, ease of growth and maintenance, resistance to insect infestation, and transpiration rate), using an easy to read bar chart which appears on the same page as the description and picture.

This book is an excellent addition to an avid collector's plant library, both for its curiosity value and 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 and layout are lovely.

Reviewer: James F. Hodgson M.D. from Kennett, MO USA
Superb easy to read book with lots of colorful photos. Written by a highly respected scientist who was in charge of keeping the air clean in space capsules for NASA until his retirement. Dr. Wolverton also is founder of Houseplants for clean air society. He explains in easy to read fashion the dangerous air polutants in your house: where they come from, and best yet, how to get rid of them. His many years research into the subject give the reader this easy to understand handbook on making the air in your house healthy. I, of course, have benefitted from the book; but so have many of my patients. Those benefitting the most are asthma patients and patients with chronic sinus problems. What a wonderful book!

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