Landscaping Ideas To Hide A Fence

Unhappy with the boring fencing panels around your garden? Here are some landscaping ideas to hide a fence.

Most gardens will have some kind of fence to mark the boundary and afford some privacy. But good looking fences are few and far between. So here are some landscaping ideas to hide a fence and make your garden feel more attractive.

BEFORE YOU START

Before you even think about hiding your garden fence, please take the time to find out who it belongs to.  If the fence belongs to your neighbour you could be breaking the law by making any changes to it. Make sure you are fully aware of what is and isn’t permissible.

Why Do You Want To Hide A Fence?

There are lots of ways to hide a fence, but how will you choose the best solution for you?  First of all, have a good think about WHY you want to disguise that feature? What are you trying to achieve?

• Is it the colour that you don’t like?
• The texture?
• Does the fence feel like a barrier – as if your garden were a prison yard?
• Perhaps the fencing doesn’t suit the styling in the rest of your garden.
• Is the structure too open so that you feel exposed?
• Do you have nosy neighbours peering over the fence at you?

In some cases, you may be able to find a quick-fix answer to your problem. It’s not hard to hide a fence with some tall plants. But sometimes, changing the layout of your garden will make the fence seem less onerous to you.

Hiding A Fence With Garden Layout Changes

Imagine for a moment, being out on your patio, relaxing on your sun lounger and lifting your head to see nothing but ugly fence panels at the end of the garden. But what if your patio faced in a different direction? Wouldn’t that improve your view? 

There’s no law to say that a patio or deck needs to be right beside your house.  In fact, very often, there’ll be one corner of the garden that cannot be seen from neighbouring properties. And that is the perfect place for relaxing.  You can angle your furniture so that you look at your house, across the wider landscape or even towards an attractive garden feature.  Hiding a fence might be all about directing your eye somewhere else rather than getting busy with planting.

Don’t Try To Hide The Fence, Make It Into A Feature Instead

If you are lucky enough to own the offending fence, you could turn it into a feature rather than try to disguise it.  Use colour and lighting to give it a wow factor.

This garden wall has never been pretty, but once it was painted in a strong shade of blue it was totally transformed.  Look how those plants stand out! The whole garden suddenly has a more tropical look and feel.

Screening An Ugly Fence

Never be afraid to experiment with large plants. I don’t necessarily mean trees, although they are great. But why not try textural plants like these grasses.  In this picture we see a path heading running along the length of a garden wall. 

The path is wide enough for a wheelbarrow and leads to a utility area. But look how we’ve used ornamental grasses to create a soft screen.  

Looking from the garden towards the wall (or fence) we see movement, shadows, colour and texture, yet the plants themselves take up very little space. As an added bonus, they’re very low maintenance. Plus, you won’t graze your elbow on them while you’re using the path!

There are other types of garden screening you could use in a similar way. Trellis or patterned screens are relatively easy to install and look great.

Using Climbing Plants

Climbing plants are the traditional solution for hiding a fence. Again, you need to check that you own the fence before adding support wires and plants. You also need to be confident that the fence is in good condition and that you won’t need to pull the plants down in order to maintain the timber.

Roses and clematis are popular climbing plants, but they’re not the only ones.  How about scented jasmine, variegated ivy, honeysuckle, or even a grape vine? You could also cloak your fence with runner beans or climbing squashes. Although these will definitely not hide your fence all year round. Don’t forget to check that the soil and sunlight conditions are correct for the plants you are using.

Green Wall Panels

It is possible to buy artificial green wall panels that attach to a fence. Using artificial plants is a matter of personal choice. They can look amazing and they are incredibly low maintenance, but there’s no denying that they are plastic. And just like artificial turf, they are  not easily recycled.

This 3D garden design shows climbing plants growing on slatted timber panels.  The plants can be pruned to give a neat, geometric appearance. Overall, this would look amazing if timber fencing were alternated with rectangular plant panels.

Trees and Hedges

Trees and hedges have a wonderful way of making your garden feel as though it is immersed in nature. And there’s no reason why you can’t grow a hedge right in front of a fence. It will hide the fence panels beautifully and provide a home for wildlife at the same time.

If your aim is to raise the height of a boundary fence, perhaps to block out road noise or screen your garden from neighbours’ windows – pleached trees are awesome.  They don’t take up much of your garden space but at the same time they are incredibly elegant.  They will need pruning every year though.  If you don’t have a head for heights, you’ll need to call in the professionals to keep your pleached trees looking good.

These copper beech trees will grow quickly to create a living screen to hide the fence.

Finally, I want to talk about espalier trees. Espaliers are trees that have been trained to grow sideways.  It’s a method that was used a lot in victorian kitchen gardens where fruit trees were grown against the wall.  This space-saving method of cultivation also helped protect tender blossoms against frost and enabled the gardeners to grow delicate fruit such as peaches and apricots. 

A simple frame built in front of your fence would potentially allow you to grow some of your own food. Worth thinking about!

Espelier fruit trees are a productive way to hide a fence. But don’t think you have to stick to fruit trees – how about a pyracantha with its evergreen foliage and fiery red autumn berries?

Change The Fence!

There’s no sense in hiding a fence if you are at liberty to change it into something you are happy to look at.  Providing you own the fence and there are no planning restrictions on it – swap it for something you love.  

This is a boundary fence that we constructed using  a combination of filled gabion baskets and cedar slats. It’s far more attractive than standard fencing panels.

If you’re struggling for landscaping ideas to hide a fence, talk to a garden designer. We’re full of bright ideas!

Get in touch with Dan from SilverBirch Gardens.

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