Commercial planters for apartment buildings can play a big role in a property’s look, feel, and functionality and can even ensure buildings are places that residents feel great coming home to.

Even in a year when apartment construction was down 12% due to the COVID-19 pandemic, it was still expected that 283,000 brand new apartments would hit the market in 2020.

And for the people who will be residing in them, as well as the nearly one in eight Americans who already live in apartments, having a beautiful and functional building to come home to is an important part of their daily lives.

While architecture and incredible finishings are one big component in making a beautiful and functional building a reality, there are a ton of reasons why commercial planters for apartment buildings also play an important role in the building’s look, feel, and functionality.

Incorporating the Body and Mind Benefits of Plants

Your home should be your sanctuary—a place where you feel calm and at peace, and a place you love coming back to.

For apartment developers or building managers, commercial planters for apartment buildings are a great way to create that feeling for residents.

Why?

Because the plants you put in these planters can offer a ton of body and mind benefits.

In fact, the term biophilia was coined by Harvard naturalist Dr. Edward O. Wilson, who hypothesized that humans tend to be inherently drawn toward nature and to feel an affinity, love, and even have a craving for it.

Plants have been shown to offer a wide array of mind and body benefits, including but not limited to:

Boosting Air Quality: Having plants isn’t just visually appealing. It can purify the air around you. A famous study from NASA found that indoor plants can scrub the air of cancer-causing volatile organic compounds like formaldehyde and benzene.
Reduced Symptoms of Depression: For those who suffer from seasonal or clinical depression, plants have been shown to have properties that help reduce the effects of these symptoms. To learn more, read our article on the topic.
Improving Mood: Plants have a measurable impact on your mood. A survey conducted at four San Francisco Bay Area hospitals found that 79% of patients said they felt more relaxed and calm, 19% more positive, and 25% felt refreshed and stronger after spending time in a garden.
Relieving Stress and Anxiety: Looking at plants and flowers, whether indoors or outdoors, is a peaceful activity free of worries or conflict. It encourages living in the present moment and engages the senses. When you take time to smell the sweet perfume of a magnolia tree, for example, your cortisol levels drop. In fact, spending time in natural settings even helps speed up recovery from mental fatigue, slow down heart rate, reduce high blood pressure, and lower anxiety.

Having commercial planters for apartment buildings situated in and around your property can offer real mental, physical, and emotional benefits to the building’s residents.

Adding Awe-Inspiring Apartment Building Entrances

*Connect Modular Planter System at 613 Baltic Brooklyn, NY*

Commercial planters for apartment buildings are a great way to highlight entryways into your building.

Using only a few strategically selected planters, you can transform your building’s entrance into a beautiful and welcoming space.

We’d recommend considering both planters for trees as well as smaller planters for shrubs and flowers, depending on your space availability.

If you’re not sure where to start, don’t worry. We created a resource to help you pick the perfect planters for your planting plan.

Creating Separate Pool and Patio Areas

*Custom Modern Elite Planters at Villa BXV in Bronxville, NY*

One of the best aspects of living in an apartment building or complex is getting access to its incredible amenities.

In many buildings, this includes amazing outdoor spaces like pools and patios. Commercial planters for apartment buildings can help enhance the look, feel, and functionality of these spaces in a number of ways, including:

Framing Areas: Commercial planters for apartment buildings can be used around the perimeter of pools or patios to create beautiful, lush borders that separate them from the rest of the property.
Creating All-New Spaces: You can use commercial planters for apartment buildings to create all-new spaces in pool and patio areas. For example, this could be separating cabana or seating areas from one another or creating smaller lounge areas for smaller groups.
Adding Privacy: Plants are a great way to support privacy in apartments and condos, whether to prevent viewing from outside of the pool or patio area or to separate individual seating areas. So, using strategically placed commercial planters for apartment buildings can help support privacy on your property.
Enforcing Social Distancing: In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, using commercial planters for apartments to separate one space from another can be an innovative way to enforce social distancing to ensure residents can still enjoy their amenities in a safely and responsibly.

For more inspiration and examples of how you can use commercial planters for apartments as dividers in amenity and common areas, take a look at our article on the topic.

Adding Pathways to Apartment Communities

In the same way that commercial planters for apartments can be used to create separation in common areas, they can also be used to create pathways and walkways in outdoor spaces.

This not only makes walkways more visually appealing, it also helps create pathways that direct foot traffic between different areas of the building or apartment complex.

One great way to do this is by creating continuous plant dividers, which can be made using our Connect Modular Planter System. When an open trough planting area is specified, there are four options to create a long green wall:

Non-Bolted Butt-Joined Planters: For less permanent applications where planters don’t need to be bolted together, the non-bolted butt-joined planter can be used. They allow complete flexibility for future design modifications if the needs of the space should change.
Bolted Butt-Joined Planters: Bolted butt-joined modular planters are individual planters that have predrilled holes in the side of the planters close to the top or rim of the planter wherever there is a joint. When complete, the bolted butt-joined planters look like one long planter.
Trough Flange-Joined Planters: Trough flange-joined modular planters are a long continuous channel of planters. There are flanges or gussets below the fill-line that bolt the planters together. The flanged-joined planters provide a tighter vertical joint. This modular design also provides a continuous open trough so that you can space ornamental trees or other foliage more evenly over the entire run.
Bottomless Retention Edging Planters: These modular planters are created with the same planter sub walls as the other but are manufactured without a bottom so that the existing sub-base of soil can be used.

To learn more, check out our Modular Planter Guide.

The Best Commercial Planters for Apartment Buildings

*Noel Metal Bench at 30 East Huron Chicago, IL*

So, now that you understand the many different uses for commercial planters for apartments, we know what you’re thinking: how do you go about picking the right planters for your specific needs?

That’s a great question. Here are two great examples of real-world projects that were done using our commercial planters for apartment buildings:

Villa BXV in Bronxville, NY: The award-winning Villa BXV landscape in Bronxville, New York, featured Custom Modern Elite Aluminum Planters in its clubroom grand courtyard, spa fitness terrace, rear lobby terrace, and the parking courtyard. All of these large planters were made of 0.125" heavy-gauge, marine-grade aluminum and fabricated with internal bracing to hold trees and small plantings. Planters were powder-coated in suede bronze and matte black depending on their respective final destinations.
613 Baltic in Brooklyn, NY: Baltic, located in the sought-after neighborhood of Park Slope in New York, has eleven-stories of luxury condominiums. The building utilized PureModern’s custom aluminum planters to grace the terrace on the second floor and a roof deck. The roof decks were complete with seating areas for lounging, dining, and grilling. These planters were fabricated to hold lights when needed and were powder-coated in matte black.

We know that picking the right commercial planters for apartments is an important, but not always easy, decision.

So, if you’d like some help in picking the right planters for your space, contact us to speak with one of our experts today. We’re here to help answer any questions you might have.