Plants for privacy from neighbours?

waterwatereverywhere

Hi,

We have a low garden wall between our house and next door neighbours and would like to get a bit more privacy by planting something.

We would like something which gives year round cover and ideally something which flowers and is pretty to look at - fast growing and easy to keep. (we thought of clematis but this dies back to bare branches and we want something which stays green year round).

Either to grow from pots which we could dot along the base line of the garden wall to grow tall or we may fix a trellis of some kind and have something trail along it up as high as possible.

Please can anyone suggest what plants would be most suitable?

Many thanks.

amcluesent

Ivy or Leyllanddii

peter_the_piper

Clematis Armandii is evergreen and has nice flowers, also Jasmine, Trachelospermum Jasminoides, That should do for a start.

Lord_Gardener

Adding the trellis will give you the instant feeling of extra privacy. Bamboo (in pots if invasive variety) can work well. If you are looking for flowers/ evergreen, look for an evergreen vine such as Star Jasmine or coral pea. Another option would be to grow some runner beans/ pea's and get a crop! These, will not offer 'green' all year round but like Clematis will offer structure giving privacy!

Tomtom07

We have the same sort of issue, we've not long moved into a new build and our neighbour (who in the nicest way is a few sandwiches short of a picnic) stands at the fence and stares over, my OH and I are in disbute if we should put willow screening up or trellis, I think trellis will give the sign of privacy (& tell the neighbour to back off), my OH doesn't think she will get the hint. so I will be watching this thread to see what everyone comes up with and if I have any further ideas I will let you know OP

waterwatereverywhere

TomTom07 - poor you, I do know exactly how you feel ... sometimes it can feel like your neighbours are actually in your garden...!

Thanks all for the useful tips - would love to use leylandii but I know that can be a real nuisance in terms of spread so will avoid that I think - much as I like the idea of the sort of "barrier" effect it provides.....:D

Think the clematis armandii, jasmine and bamboo sound like the best bets - are these reasonable growers or could we feed them huge amounts of miracle grow so we have some privacy for summer sunbathing....?!

ecgirl07

We have decided to go for Bamboo and luckily Dobbies had 10 litre pots half price this week £30 down from £60 good luck in finding them though as they are selling like hotcakes.

floyd

We had a similar problem and decided on planting bamboo phyllostachys bissettii as it is evergreen and forms a dense quick-growing screen. We planted ours in part sunken cold-water loft tanks to stop them invading elsewhere and they have done really well.
On the down side, the neighbours got a big dog a year or so later and on their suggestion we incresed the height of our fence to keep the dog out so it was a wasted expense in the long run given that they weren't at all offended by us putting up a big fence!

fishie2

I have a couple of bamboo which I use as a screen, can work out expensive if you buy them big though.

littleme96

Nothing to add, but thanks so much for this! We've recently moved and there is a low wire fence in between us and our neighbours. We don't really want to pay for fencing as we don't know how long we'll be here, but I will try out some of these suggestions.

Steel_2

We have neighbour issues.

The gardens are on a slope so they start tall by the house and drop to three feet by the time you get half way down the garden. That of course is where all the kids play stuff is. It's very difficult to eat outside in the sun (no sun in the late afternoon or evening down by the patio so we move up the garden) when you can see and hear multiple children bouncing madly on the trampoline and play fighting. All the time we're asked "What ya doing" from their three kids and those of the rest of the neighbours' that pile into their garden because they have the good toys.

And then there's the balls. I threw back nine footballs the other day plus one rugby ball and a tennis ball. Oh and two crisp packets, a curly wurly packet, a wet trainer, a sock and the cover for their wirly gig dryer.

BUT the parents are lovely and the hubby goes out of his way to help as much as he can. He's always laughing and joking with us over the fence.

[sigh] for the sake of keeping the peace we put up with it.

But I long for a really fantastic big border with multiple evergreen shrubs that will grow big and start to shield us a bit from them. Can't do trellising as the fences are set in concrete posts and regularly broken by the kids and need replacing (not by us fortunately).

We feel very exposed all the time.