Preserved flower materials · Kunming, Yunnan
Preserved moss board — coverage, colour and installation
Loose in 5 kg cartons or as 30 × 30 cm sheet-mounted panels, preserved moss is supplied from Kunming, Yunnan in 16+ stock colours at an estimated 0.6–0.8 m² per kilo at 30 mm depth (as of October 2026), confirmed against your drawing before order. Moss is the only line in our range that is bought by weight and planned by area, and that mismatch — kilos on the quotation, square metres on the drawing — is where most estimating errors happen on a moss wall. Depth and colour continuity are what decide whether a finished wall looks deliberate.
The material
Sold as reindeer moss — what that actually means
What the trade calls reindeer moss is, strictly speaking, a lichen of the Cladonia group rather than a true moss; we confirm the species against the sample we send, because the handling advice below follows from it. A lichen has no roots and no vascular system — it draws what it needs from the air across its whole surface. Once stabilised and dyed it holds its form indoors, and the underlying structure stays a mass of fine branching, which is why it feels springy rather than fibrous and why the coverage figure behaves the way it does.
Sizing
Sold by weight, planned by area
A kilo of moss is a fixed thing; the area it covers is not. The same kilo laid shallow covers more wall than it does laid deep, and depth is a design decision you make rather than a property of the material. That is the whole difficulty of estimating a moss wall, and it has a straightforward answer: decide the depth first, then let us work out the weight.
Lies flat, reads as a surface
Laid thin, the material reads as a coloured plane. It covers more area per kilo and suits large fields where the wall is a background rather than a feature. Edges and joins are more visible, so layout matters more than volume.
Stands up, reads as texture
Laid deeper, the material carries shadow and reads as three-dimensional. It covers less area per kilo and suits feature walls where the moss is the subject. The extra depth is what gives the wall its character, so the added cost is usually the point.
As a planning figure, at 30 mm depth one kilo covers an estimated 0.6–0.8 m². The range exists because packing density varies with how the material is teased out, not because the material varies — so treat it as an estimate to check with us before you size a wall from it, not a fixed conversion. On a large project the difference between 0.6 and 0.8 across many kilos is enough to matter.
Method
Planning a wall from a drawing
Four steps, and the third is the one that gets skipped. Work through them in order and you will have a weight to order rather than a guess to revise later.
Net area
Take the wall dimensions and subtract everything that is not moss — openings, signage, fixings, structural reveals. The gross wall area is rarely the area you are covering.
Depth
Decide how far the moss stands proud of the backing. This is a design decision that sets both the look and the quantity, so settle it before anything is costed, not after.
Allowance for waste and edges
Add an allowance for trimming at the perimeter and for the material lost teasing the block out to the required depth. Skipping this step is the usual reason a wall runs short at the last panel.
Convert to weight and round up
Apply the coverage figure at your chosen depth, add the allowance, then round up to whole cartons. Running short on a moss wall is far more expensive than carrying a spare carton.
Send us the net area and the depth and we will run these four steps with you rather than hand you a figure — the answer depends on decisions that are yours to make.
Formats
Sheet-mounted or loose — a labour decision
Both formats are the same material. The choice is about who does the fixing: sheet-mounted panels move the labour to us, loose moss moves it to your installer. On a large wall that is a scheduling question as much as a cost one.
| Sheet-mounted | Loose, by weight | |
|---|---|---|
| Format | 30 × 30 cm panels | Loose in 5 kg cartons |
| Packing | 10 panels per carton | One carton is one unit |
| Colour range | Stock colours | 16+ stock colours, custom colourways available |
| Installation | Backing already fixed — panels go up in sequence | Teased out and fixed by hand, piece by piece |
| Suits | Large regular fields, tight programmes, contractors working to a schedule | Irregular shapes, sculptural work, mixed-tone blending, planters |
| Trade-off | Less colour choice than loose | Much higher labour per square metre |
Mixed blend
Where a wall needs two or three tones rather than one flat colour, the mixed blend carries them in a single carton. It reads as a natural, non-uniform field, which is often what a designer wants — but the proportion of tones is set at packing rather than specified panel by panel. If a scheme needs exact proportions, order single tones and blend on site.
Colour
16+ stock colours, and the one-run rule
The board runs in 16+ tinted stock colours plus natural, with custom colourways available. The palette goes well beyond green — whites, pinks, reds and blues are all stocked — so a scheme is not locked to a green wall.
Because the colour is dyed rather than inherent, two separate production runs of the same recipe will read slightly different when they are placed side by side. On a single panel nobody notices. Across a wall it is immediately visible, and it cannot be corrected on site.
The rule is therefore simple: order the entire wall quantity from one production run. Tell us the total area at the outset, even if the installation is going up in stages, and we will size it as one run so the panels match. Ordering stage by stage as the programme advances is the single most common cause of a two-tone wall.
On site, keep panels from one run together and do not mix cartons between stages. If a wall is going to be seen in raking light — a corridor, a window wall — the run matters even more, because raking light exaggerates a shade difference that would be invisible under flat lighting.
Handling
Moisture, installation and storage
Moss is for interior use. It will not survive outdoors, and it should not be installed where it will be rained on, splashed or exposed to condensation — a bathroom ceiling or a wall above a kitchen line are both poor choices, not because the material is fragile but because the surface absorbs.
Keep cartons sealed and off a concrete floor until the material is used. An opened carton left in a damp room will soften, and once softened the springiness that gives the wall its depth does not fully return. Reseal part-used cartons, and store them flat rather than stacked under weight, since the material compresses and takes time to recover.
At installation, fix the backing first and work from one corner in sequence so the tone progression is controlled. Do not over-work the material at the edges; it is trimmed more cleanly with a straight cut than by pulling. Direct sun will fade any dye over time, so a wall in a bright south-facing position will move more than one in indirect light — worth mentioning to your client at handover rather than after.
A commercial invoice and an itemised packing list are issued with every shipment. Carton dimensions and chargeable weight are confirmed at quotation. Certificates and fire-performance reports are confirmed per destination — tell us the standard the project is being specified against and we will say plainly whether we can meet it. Delivery is quoted EXW (Kunming) first, then FOB where you have a forwarder at the port, with DAP as the last option; tell us the destination and we will confirm the workable term.
Where it goes
Projects that suit a moss surface
Feature walls
Reception and retail walls where the surface itself is the design statement.
Signage & logos
Panels cut around lettering allow a logo to sit on a planted field rather than against a flat colour.
Terrariums & planters
The springy base under glass, needing no watering and no drainage layer.
Event & display builds
Temporary installations that need to look planted for a week without any maintenance regime.
Before you order
Moss wall questions, in the order they arise
Take the net area after subtracting openings and fixings, decide the depth you want the moss to stand proud, add an allowance for perimeter trimming and for teasing the material out, then apply the coverage figure at that depth and round up to whole cartons. Send us the net area and the depth and we will run the same calculation with you.
Because the material is teased out by hand, and how densely it is packed into the depth you have chosen varies between installers and between panels. At 30 mm depth the working figure is roughly 0.6–0.8 m² per kilo. On a large wall that range is wide enough to matter, which is why we would rather confirm it against your drawing than have you size a project from it.
You can, but we would advise against it for anything where the panels will be seen together. Two separate production runs of the same recipe read slightly different side by side, and that difference cannot be corrected once the panels are on the wall. Give us the total area at the outset even if the installation is staged, and we will size and hold it as one run.
What the trade sells as reindeer moss is normally a lichen of the Cladonia group rather than a true moss, and we confirm the species on the sample. The distinction matters practically: a lichen has no roots or vascular system, so it absorbs across its whole surface and responds to the humidity of whatever room it is stored or installed in. That is why storage conditions affect it more than they would a true plant.
Minimums are set per reference and confirmed on your quotation, and they differ between loose cartons and sheet-mounted panels. Because moss is ordered to a computed weight rather than to a piece count, the practical starting point is whatever whole cartons your area works out to — tell us the drawing and we will advise.
Keep reading
What goes on top of a moss base
How a wall area becomes a weight, what trimming allowances add, and why one run should cover the whole wall are worked through in specifying a moss wall by area and depth.
Next step
Send the dimensions and the depth — we will size the run
Net wall area, the depth you want, the colour direction and whether it is one wall or a staged programme. We come back with a weight, a carton count and the shipping options, usually within one business day.