We just bought our first home in zone 7a. The neighbor to the right has a very built up pool and lounge area, and unlike the other sides of our yard that have a privacy fence, this side has a picket fence. It doesn’t look as bad from the photo, but it is a clear and straight line of sight from the living room, kitchen, and backyard directly into their lounge area, and it’s just a naturally a bit uncomfortable to be on stage when we are out back with our two young toddlers.
Any landscaping suggestions for privacy? I had initially thought of some emerald green arborvitae, but I’m not sure that would be the best fit for this.
by clust10
4 Comments
Plant a nice hedge. Problem solved. Or if the lady of the house next door is attractive and likes to lie out in her small bathing suit, don’t plant a hedge. Your choice.
Plant a row of different decorative shrubs. Or tall plants.
I am immediately thinking of lilac, butterfly bush, camelia, viburnums or a not weeping Japanese maple. In perennials and grasses: Giant canna, Eupatorium, cortaderia, lavatera, panicum or Miscanthus.
Emerald Green Arborvitae is the default panic move when people feel like they are living in a fishbowl. A straight soldier row of those things looks like a cemetery boundary and if one dies you are left with a glaring missing tooth in your privacy wall. You need a staggered mixed border to actually build structure and visual calm. Pull a wide sweeping bed out from that picket fence and plant a mix of broadleaf evergreens like Skip Laurels or dense Hollies layered with a structural ornamental tree right in the direct line of sight from your living room window. This gives you immediate dense screening while looking like an intentional landscape instead of a cheap barricade.
When you start pulling beds out into a yard it gets hard to picture how much toddler running room you are going to lose. Grab a wide photo of that fence line and run it through the GardenDream web app first. It acts as a digital blueprint so you can overlay different bed shapes and plant masses right on your actual grass. Test out how a deep curved bed looks versus a narrow one before you waste a weekend cutting sod and blowing your budget on large nursery stock.
Whatever you decide on make sure you plant everything in one continuous sweeping mulch bed. Digging isolated holes in the turf for individual trees creates a restless cluttered mess and guarantees you will be fighting the weed whacker around trunks for the next ten years. Build the structure right the first time and the privacy will take care of itself.
I’m putting up a privacy screen over our fence on a bare side of the yard. The other side has very well established English Ivy that the previous owners installed; it’s very tall, and green and thick; hard to clean. That saying is has provided so much privacy and it’s beautiful year around.
Next I’m doing pink jasmine on a wall and Star jasmine on another.
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