Screening Ideas

TheChunk

Afternoon all,

We're currently in the process of buying a house which (lucky for me!) has a bigger garden than our current small courtyard type garden.

The only downside is that it's quite overlooked by the upstairs windows of the house at the rear as the picture below shows. I'm looking for some ideas to give some privacy.

I was thinking of putting in maybe 2 or 3 small trees about 2/3 or 3/4 of the way along the length of the garden along with maybe a low fence or hedge which would also help hide the sheds and give me somewhere to tuck away spare pots, compost bin, my daughter's toys etc.

Any thoughts on this or any other ideas?




I found this picture of how the garden used to look before it was neglected - there used to be some large trees in the neighbours garden which are now gone by the look of it.



Thanks,
Alan

Fire

Which way does the garden face, Alan?

TheChunk

H Fire, the garden faces South West.

Buttercupdays

Your idea of the small trees could work really well, if you you make it into part of the garden design. If you had one on either side the grass could become a wide zigzag pathway, with the tree or a large shrub part of a planted area. You could keep it formal with a trellis and climbers, and an evergreen hedge and even some topiary if it took your fancy, or make the path way curved with a mix of evergreen and deciduous flowering shrubs and perennials.

The garden would look wider and be more interesting to explore, as you wouldn't see it all at once, and your daughter could have a secret corner of her own.  You could choose to hide the sheds or maybe give one a paint job, a climber and a colourful planter so it makes a good focal point at the end

Lizzie27

It looks like you would only need perhaps one tree to line up with the upstairs windows, maybe one other to balance the picture. Don't forget that if you go for a deciduous tree which drops its leaves in winter, then you may still get slightly overlooked, but we have found that's not much of a problem.  Also, you will need to pick up the leaves in autumn(hopefully composting them) and the grass may not grow as well under the tree. Having said all that, a small tree (s) would add to the garden interest all year round.

KT53

Something like rowan or hawthorn grows quite quickly but is quite 'open' in form.  It will disrupt the view from the neighbours without casting too much shadow in your garden.