120cm is tall. This is a floor vase stem before it is anything else.

In a floor vase of 40cm to 50cm, a full-length stem gives you a finished height of well over a metre and a half, which is genuinely architectural in a corner. That is the use this length was made for.

On a console or a sideboard, cut it down. The guide is a finished arrangement about one and a half times the height of the vessel, so a 30cm vase wants around 45cm of stem showing.

Allow for the spread. The branch is open and reaching rather than upright, so it occupies considerably more width than the stem alone suggests. Do not put it where people walk past closely.

Two or three stems maximum in one vessel. This is an open, airy branch and its whole character is the space between the leaves. Crowd it and you lose exactly what you bought it for.

The colour, and the openness of the branch.

Physocarpus Diabolo is one of the best-known dark-leaved shrubs in British gardens, and the reason is the colour: a deep burgundy so dark it reads almost black, with a plum cast where light catches it. Faux foliage is overwhelmingly green, so a genuinely dark stem does something nothing else on the shelf can.

The leaves are small, serrated and three-lobed, carried in loose clusters along the branch rather than densely packed. Dense faux foliage looks like a hedge; this looks like a branch, because the spaces between the leaves are as important as the leaves.

The branch reaches and curves rather than standing straight, with side shoots at irregular angles. That irregularity is the hardest thing to get right in faux stems and the first thing your eye checks.

There is a wire core through the main stem and the branches, so the whole thing can be opened out or drawn in to suit the corner it stands in.

• Near-black burgundy, a colour almost nothing else in faux foliage offers
• 120cm long, tall enough for a proper floor vase arrangement
• Open, airy branching, so it reads as a branch rather than a bush
• Small serrated leaves in loose clusters along the stem
• Bendable wire core through the branches as well as the stem
• One stem fills a corner, where green foliage needs three
• The dark note a neutral room needs, without painting anything
• No watering, no drop, no light needed

The openness is the point. Two stems in a tall vessel, angled apart so the branches interlace rather than overlap, is the arrangement. Five would be a shrub.

Near-black foliage against a dark wall disappears entirely. Against off white, oatmeal or a pale plaster wall the silhouette reads properly, and that silhouette is what you are buying.

Bend the branches so they reach away from the vessel rather than standing upright. A branch that leans looks like it grew; a branch that stands looks like it was put there.

A cream or stone vessel under dark foliage gives you the contrast. A dark vessel under dark foliage reads as one heavy block.

If you change anything seasonally, this is the easiest change there is. Green foliage through spring and summer, burgundy from September, and the room shifts without moving any furniture.

Dust with a soft brush or a hairdryer on cool. Small clustered leaves are awkward to wipe individually, and a brush or moving air clears them far faster than a cloth.

Do not stand it in water. If your vessel holds water for real stems, keep this one dry. Water can lift the leaf coating and mark the wire.

Cut with secateurs, not scissors. There is wire inside the stem, and household scissors will neither cut it cleanly nor survive the attempt.

Shape it once, properly. The wire will take repeated bending, but working the same spot back and forth weakens it. Open the branch out, decide the shape and leave it.

Keep it out of strong direct sun. Dark dyes fade more visibly than pale ones, and a burgundy stem in a sunny window will lose its depth within a couple of years.

What to expect. The branch will need opening out after unpacking, since it travels compressed. Ten minutes of bending the side shoots outward makes the difference between a good arrangement and a flat one.

It ships as a long parcel, and the branch will need opening out after unpacking. Current timescales and charges are set out on our delivery page.

Not sure how many stems you need, or what vessel suits? Send us the measurements and we will tell you. Reach us via our contact page or live chat.

If it is not right, our returns process is straightforward, and everything is covered by our guarantees and warranties.

Our price match promise stands if you find the same piece for less elsewhere. Dressing a holiday let or a showhome? Ask about trade accounts.