All summer, this was the display of house plants in my living room. It changed a little bit as I shifted them around trying to decide on the best placement and a sort of symmetry. Don’t get me wrong–I am not the sort of person who has to get everything perfectly symmetrical—especially if it’s detrimental to plants–but some arrangements do look better than others. And of course, some of these so-called “low light” house plants take more light than others.
Things will change again when I bring in my summering house plants. The table up above will have a fuller load of plants, reducing the light getting to these “low-light” plants. SO I might have to rearrange them again to be sure everyone is growing happily.
You’ll notice that the more highly variegated or more brightly colored plants are toward the front–or the light. As a general rule, the more variegation a plant has, the more light it can take. This is true even in outdoor “shade” plants like hosta.
At the same time, you need to be very careful about too much sun. The second that the white fusion peacock calathea gets a little too much sun–at the same time that it is a little too dry–its leaves brown. Very ugly. SO it is good to know little cultural tips and tricks about these plants (it helps to know that in general, caalthea prefer it a bit moist).
If that last paragraph was all mumbo-jumbo, come back next week. I’ll showcase all these individual house plants and talk about what they like!
Gardendaze 
In landscaping, some of the variegated plants are more tolerant of shade than those that are not variegated. However, those that are not so tolerant of shade will be pale in shade, and lacking ‘contrast’. Variegation (if provided by plants that do not mind shade) brightens dark spots in the garden.
Very true. That’s why most of us up here in the “frozen north” love hosta. The variegated ones take the shade nicely–& we’re all gardening under old growth trees up here. Many of the other variegated plants are too fussy for my conditions. It’s not that they won’t take the cold–most will, technically. But I have the added joy of gardening on rock ledge in heavy clay that stays soaking wet very late into the spring. It took me years to figure out that’s what was killing the plants. Live and learn.
Karla