Planting for Privacy | Part 2

Here are some more ideas for planting for privacy…

Traditionally we select plants that are great for hedging.  This can be anything from camellias to lilly pillies and of course the most common of them all, Murraya.  Any plant that can be comfortably hedged to 2- 3 metres will typically be a small tree that could mature to anywhere between 5 and 10 metres.  We would clip them in a manner that would maintain density with the branching and leaf coverage from the top of the hedge all the way down to the ground.  The down side of this though is that in most cases we require hedging on modest-sized blocks of land and although hedging can be kept to narrow widths it still takes up valuable floor space in confined areas.

The solution to this is to ‘pleach’ these hedging plants.  This is removing the lower foliage on these shrubs to make them look more like trees; effectively creating a hedge on stilts.  This has the advantage of creating space underneath enabling additional planting of low shrubs and groundcovers.  It adds an extra dimension to the garden, increases the visual proportions and we can also then up light from underneath creating a dramatic night-time effect.  This pruning technique can also be applied to bamboo which if cared for properly can yield the fastest screening result out of the narrowest of spaces.

So love thy neighbour?  Not if you’re not in the mood.