Prosperplast Vena Ribbed Plastic Plant Pot

The Vena answers a problem most houseplants create: the plant looks good, the thin black nursery pot it arrived in does not. Drop that grower’s pot straight into a Vena and the plant keeps its roots where they are while the room gets something worth looking at. The pot tapers gently from a narrow flat base to a wider, softly rounded rim, and the whole outside is cut with fine horizontal ribbing that runs from base to lip.

It is moulded in plastic as a single piece, with nothing to assemble and nothing that can work loose. The colour runs right through the moulding rather than sitting on the surface, so the inside of the pot matches the outside and a knock against a table leg does not reveal a different shade underneath. The base is closed, with no drainage holes, which is what lets the pot stand directly on furniture, and the underside carries the Vena name moulded into the plastic.

Three diameters run through the range, 14 cm, 16 cm and 18 cm, each following the sizes plants are usually sold in. Eight colours cover most rooms: anthracite and light grey for a cooler scheme, white and white chocolate where the wall does the talking, hazelnut, caramel and marsala for warmer interiors, and pine green for anyone who wants the pot to disappear into the foliage. Caramel is offered in the two smaller diameters. Because the profile is identical across every size and colour, three of them on a windowsill read as a set rather than a collection.

It suits a kitchen worktop, a desk, a bookshelf, a bathroom windowsill or a hallway console, anywhere a plant has to sit on a surface that would mark. Keep the plant in its nursery pot and lift it out over the sink at watering time, or plant into the Vena directly and water with a light hand, since the closed base gives surplus water nowhere to go.