### Flowers in crates and planters in Phuket: the surface decides the order Clients choose this format by the container, because the container is the part with a number against it. What arrives at the address is the planting standing above the timber, and what governs both is the piece of furniture it has to live on. That third measurement is the one nobody sends with the order. A crate is rigid, and rigid things either fit a surface or hang off it. Resort room windowsills are the usual casualty. They are shallower than people remember, and a box overhanging the front edge gets knocked whenever the curtain moves or the balcony door swings open. Villa dining tables set their limit somewhere else. Height is the constraint there, since anything rising above a seated eyeline splits a long table into two conversations and gets moved to the floor before the second course. The planting can be as generous as you like, provided it stays low and runs along the table instead of piling up in the middle. A planter answers both problems by being compact. It takes a console, a nightstand or a hall table, it reads from every side rather than from the front, and it does not commit a room to one long horizontal line. Rooms at Rosewood Phuket, The Slate Phuket and Veranda Resort Phuket take far more planters than crates for that reason, while a villa at Bang Tao or Surin with a terrace table takes the crate happily. Before anything is planted, four questions: - Which surface it goes on: windowsill, counter, dining table or hall console. - The depth of that surface, if it is a sill. - Whether people will be sitting opposite each other at that table. - Whether the box stays where it is delivered or gets carried on afterwards, since a planted crate is heavy, travels flat on the floor of the vehicle and is lifted from underneath rather than by the side slats. #### Getting it to the address The west coast run takes 90 to 180 minutes and covers Patong, Kata, Karon, Kamala, Bang Tao and Surin, with Phuket Town, Rawai, Chalong and Mai Khao on the same board. Villas, marinas and airport routes have separate windows, which is a practical matter rather than paperwork: a berth and a hillside villa both finish with the box carried by hand for the last stretch. Rain moves the timing, not the plan. From May to October, and on the hill roads after dark, we build extra time into the route, because a long crate cannot be hurried under an umbrella the way a wrapped bouquet can. An airport arrival is the one scenario we usually talk people out of. A planted box is awkward through a terminal and there is nowhere sensible for it in a car afterwards, so that gift goes to the room and waits there instead. Delivery runs 9 AM to 10 PM, orders start from 2200 THB, and payment goes by bank card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, PromptPay, bank transfer or cash to the courier in baht. #### What goes into the box Thai orchids give the vertical this format otherwise lacks, and they are worth the space because a crate planted flat all the way across looks like a tray. Tropical foliage holds the outline longer than anything else in there. Chrysanthemums and hydrangeas supply the mass that stops a long line looking thin, while imported roses and seasonal peonies lift the centre. Density beats variety. A few kinds planted thickly hold the line, and a dozen kinds in ones and twos scatter it into something that reads as clutter from the doorway. > "The planting should look wider and taller than the box holding it. When the flowers stop level with the walls, people notice the crate first and the flowers second." > JFLOO florist Both containers outlive the planting, which is half the reason anyone buys one. A crate takes tools, bottles, spices or seedlings once the foam comes out, and a planter takes a houseplant still in its plastic pot with a saucer under it. Put a mat under either one on a polished table, and the surface that decided the whole order survives it as well.