PHILADELPHIA -- We spend what, eight, 10 hours a day in our grim-gray cubicles at work? They're all alike, with their faded fabric dividers affording no privacy and dirt-brown carpets darkened with hints of soup and soda.

"Get me outta here!" would seem a rational response to such conditions. Who does their best work in that?

Jailbreak, lottery win ... probably not in the cards for us. So here's a more practical road to workplace relief:

The cubby garden.

Imagine an indoor forest of golden pothos, their yellow-green heart-shaped leaves framing our desktops. Then picture a line of fluted peace lilies arrayed elegantly before a wall, or a curtain of shiny jades separating you and the boss.

"You look around and see a garden flowering. It lifts your spirits, especially in winter," says Marilyn E. Reynolds, an office-plant buff whose cubby at the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society is filled with green.

She knows, from experience, that office landscaping -- "interiorscaping" in industry parlance -- can be liberating for the soul and, as a growing body of research suggests, healthier for mind and body.

This leads to something else, sure to warm the boss' heart: Cubby gardening may even boost productivity and lower absenteeism.

Regarding care for plants, as Ken O'Brien says, you have to cover the basics -- low light and a little water -- for your office plants. But it doesn't get much more basic than that.

Mr. O'Brien is vice president/branch manager at the regional office of Initial Tropical Plants in Souderton, Montgomery County. The company installs and maintains office plants for commercial buildings, malls, restaurants and stores. It might surprise you, then, to know that the cubbies in his office aren't much different from yours and mine.

"Yeah," he says, "pretty bland."

This, and three decades in the business, have taught him a few things about cubicle gardening: Plants soften spaces and bring welcome color and personality to the office, especially when they're placed in the decorative containers that are all the rage now.

"If you just stick it in a pot, a plant is a plant is a plant," Mr. O'Brien says. "We've almost gotten to the point where the container is more important than the plant."

Most of us working stiffs, however, have our eyes on the green. Unlike people, tropicals not only survive, they thrive, in the dull, dry, single-season office environment.

Mr. O'Brien likes the pointed foliage of Rex begonia, which comes in rich mixes of burgundy, reds and pinks with swirling, starry leaves. Croton is another eye-catcher, with its crunchy leaves of yellow, pink, red and orange. Aglaonema has shiny, oval leaves in fleshy, riotous shades of green.

Such an inventory illustrates a few things: Office plants are no longer monochromatic. Foliage can be fabulous.

Just like their outdoor cousins, Mr. O'Brien says, indoor gardeners "want vibrant now. They want lush. They're paying a lot more attention to what the plants look like."

Ms. Reynolds and her Philadelphia co-workers fuss over their cubby gardens, which include the time-tested, spiky mother-in-law's tongue, surely one of the worst-named plants ever but a reliable, curious desktop plant.

They also have spider plant and variegated ivy, parlor palm and elephant ears, wandering Jew, bromeliad and begonia and kalanchoe. And then there is Ms. Reynolds' pride and joy -- a 9-foot-tall, 10-year-old ficus (or fig tree) that she brought by truck from home.

They're tough.

"People forget to water them on Friday, and by Monday they're drooping," Ms. Reynolds says, as if speaking of a neglected child. "But they rally. And they can take sun and drafts from the door."

They also take impurities out of the air, which is a good thing, given that we spend more time indoors than out.

"We've spent billions of dollars to improve air quality outdoors and haven't come anywhere close to even starting to address the problem of air pollution indoors," says Joe Minott, executive director of the Clean Air Council in Philadelphia.

A 1989 NASA study showed that many houseplants remove harmful elements from the air, including trichloroethylene found in paints, varnishes and adhesives; benzene from oils and paints, and formaldehyde from building materials and dry-cleaned clothes.

Some plants really excel at this: spider plant, pothos, English ivy, dracaena, mother-in-law's tongue, peace lily, bamboo palm, and others.

"Almost anything in the office has a potential to produce a certain amount of pollution," Mr. Minott says, "but plants are fantastic at grabbing it from the air and absorbing it. They literally clean the air."

They also stimulate a sense of physical and psychological well-being, according to a 2002 Norwegian study of 51 workplaces. In plant-filled offices, researchers found dramatic drops in worker fatigue and concentration difficulties, as well as in headache, cough, eye irritation and stuffy nose.

Turns out, all we need to work up to speed, to be happy in our cubbies, is an office full of plants. Now, about that carpeting ...