As a homeowner, you look forward to spending time in your backyard with friends and family, especially in warm spring and summer months. Creating a backyard landscape design with adequate privacy and a comfortable atmosphere can have a big impact on the enjoyment of your outdoor activities, whether you want to plan a family cookout or just kick back in your favorite lounge chair.
As the demand for outdoor spaces among homeowners grows, so too does the demand for ways to maximize privacy in those spaces. Backyards are increasingly being designed with this purpose in mind, in conjunction with maximizing enjoyment.
16 GARDEN SCREENING IDEAS FOR MAXIMUM PRIVACY
1. DRAW THE EYE INTO YOUR OWN SPACE
If your fences are quite prominent but not up to par, it is worth upgrading them to a high specification finish, like cedar. Climbers will add softness, greenery, and year-round structure to a fence if you choose an evergreen variety. Attaching modern trellis panels is another alternative that plants will quickly scramble over. These ideas turn the focus inwards.
Designer Catherine Clancy suggest that if your garden is overlooked, you should make it seem cozy and inviting so that people will focus their attention on your garden rather than on the neighboring properties. She suggests using greenery to clad the boundaries and planting shrubs generously to make the garden look lush.
Another idea is to have your seating area so that you are looking into your house rather than out. If you don’t have a lot of space, consider having built-in seating like this. To make it more private, add lots of plants.
2. LAYER THE PLANTING
It is recommended that you stagger evergreens in the background and in the foreground, step down the height with deciduous plants and perennials in order to create a natural look for your backyard landscape design. This will also allow you to replace seasonal, smaller plants when they die with a variety of new seasonal plants in different colors, shapes, sizes and textures.
3. USE LIVING WALLS TO SCREEN BOUNDARY WALLS
If you’re looking for garden screening ideas that will both hide unsightly or plain boundary walls and add another planting dimension to your yard, consider using a living wall.
Vertical gardens are a popular way to create privacy, especially in urban areas where people have small properties. They can also be used in large backyards. Vertical gardens are easy to grow on wooden trellises, open panels, or metal grids that have a support system. They can hold climbing vines, annuals and perennials, herbs, and vegetables. You can design a vertical garden to match the style of your home and enhance your yard. Vertical gardens add height and depth to your yard and create privacy so you can enjoy being outside.
Living walls are densely planted and can provide a tapestry of color and form. Reliable, long-living, disease resistant plants that are light with shallow roots are best, as they will have restricted root space. For a year-round effect, mostly evergreens are best, then highlight with seasonal color.
4. DIVIDE AND SCREEN AREAS WITH ARBORS AND ARCHES
Arbors, arches, and tunnels can be lovely focal points adorned with profusely flowering vines or flowering climbers. They can also be used as garden screening to divide different areas of the garden or to indicate an entry point to a separate garden room.
Having a green screen or living wall of plants is a great way to create a natural barrier between your backyard and your neighbor’s backyard, whether you have a structural fence or not. It can create a visual break, establish property boundaries, provide a buffer for noise and wind, hide unappealing views, soften the edges of hardscape walls and fences and create a sense of intimacy and privacy.
An arbor that is snuggled up against some dense, colorful planting can create the illusion of more space, which can be especially helpful if you have a small garden.
5. DISGUISE UNSIGHTLY AREAS
One of the most practical uses for garden screening is to hide unsightly elements in your garden such as storage or composting areas.
’ The main focus of most small gardens is to be both functional and aesthetically pleasing. They are often used as an outdoor space, in addition to being a garden.
‘It will also encourage you to tidy away garden paraphernalia and make the most of your outdoor area.’ According to garden designer Kate Gould, making your garden storage attractive can greatly contribute to making your garden a more unique and usable space all year round. Having storage in your garden will also encourage you to tidy up garden tools and other materials, making better use of your outdoor area.
If you’re looking to spruce up your garden, there are a number of different screening ideas you can use to disguise less attractive areas, depending on the location and surrounding area. For example, a decorative trellis panel covered in evergreen climbers or edible plants can serve both a aesthetic and practical purpose.
6. USE ARCHITECTURAL SALVAGE
Reclaimed sections of stone walls or follies can be used as screens to create divisions between garden rooms, opening up a wealth of possibilities.
This stone wall has a quatrefoil window that you can see through to another seating area in the garden.
7. CREATE A GARDEN SCREENING STRUCTURE
If you have a small backyard, a solid fence or stone wall may feel too confining. You can create privacy for outdoor activities by building an enclosure around your outdoor spaces with open panels, trellises and arbors. This way you can still enjoy your backyard without feeling like you’re confined to a small space.
8. ADD COLOR AND PRIVACY WITH A PRETTY AWNING
Patio covers that offer color, shade, and screening can be found in the form of garden awnings. Awnings that extend outwards above your head by more than 6ft can provide privacy, while those that extend down to the ground on either side can provide garden privacy and screening from the weather.
9. DESIGN CONTAINER GARDENS
If you want to add height, volume, and privacy to your backyard, you can do so by raising planters and container gardens. You can create a series of container gardens that will help to define your property boundaries and establish a visual buffer between you and your neighbors. If you want a more formal look, you can fill the containers with identical plants. If you prefer a more casual look, you can fill the containers with a variety of plants that offer different sizes, shapes, textures, and colors. For easy, year-round maintenance, it is best to plant native, low-maintenance plants, shrubs, and ornamental grasses like blue fescue, dwarf arborvitae, or fragrant lavender and rosemary.
10. INVEST IN LARGE PLANTS
If you’re looking to increase privacy in your backyard, it’s best to go for larger plants in your landscape design. Buying smaller plants may be cheaper upfront, but they take much longer to provide any sort of privacy screen. It’s better to get fewer, taller plants that will have an immediate effect. For quicker results, look for plants that are 4 or 5 feet tall, but pay attention to their growth patterns and required care.
11. PLANT LUSH SHRUBS FOR PRIVACY
Different shrubs offer different levels of privacy, so it is important to choose the one that best suits your needs. If you are looking for a fast-growing option, consider a Leylandii tree. If you are looking for something that provides a dense privacy screen, a Bamboo might be the best option for you.
The plants that can grow quickly and provide privacy include laurel, holly, rhododendron, privet, laurel, photinia, honeysuckle, and forsythia. Some of these plants are also on the best fast-growing shrubs list, so you can get privacy and other benefits from them.
12. CREATE GARDEN SCREENING WITH TREES
Planting trees that lose their leaves in the fall is a good way to obscure a neighbor’s view from a second-story window or terrace. These trees typically grow from 25-feet to 60-feet high, depending on the species. When planted near a property line or in the backyard, their large canopies provide privacy, as well as good shade in hot summer months. Since these trees lose their foliage in late fall and winter, the sun will be able to shine brightly into the house during these months for added light and warmth. If you want a buffer and barrier that provides maximum privacy for your backyard landscape design year-round, you should plant evergreen trees instead.
13. CREATE TALL BOUNDARIES WITH LUSH SHRUBS AND HEDGES
Shrubs and hedges can provide privacy for yards, whether the yard is large or small. Where space is tight, columnar evergreens like Italian cypress and arborvitae can provide a solution for separating adjoining yards or blocking sight lines. Shrubs and hedges can provide a year-round privacy screen and they’re not typically restricted by city ordinances that limit their height. If you plant a privet hedge, it’s best to plant individual shrubs at least 12 inches apart and bring soil up to the branching trunk. Hedges will require proper irrigation to survive. To thrive year-round, shrubs and hedges should be properly trimmed as needed to prevent overgrowth and dead growth.
14. INSTALL OUTDOOR FOUNTAINS FOR NOISE SCREENING
You may be close enough to your neighbors to hear them when you’re in your backyard. If you’re in a neighborhood where houses are built close together, you may hear noise like barking dogs, air conditioner compressors, televisions, stereos, and conversations. You can mask unwanted noises by adding an outdoor fountain to your backyard landscape design. The sound of the fountain will block out other noises. When choosing a fountain, note that the further water falls, the louder it becomes. Choose a size and style that provides the right amount of noise reduction and privacy.
15. BUILD A SUMMERHOUSE OR PAVILION
You should put your summerhouse or pavilion at the back of your yard where it will be least noticed. The roof and walls of the building will act as a visual barrier, creating a private space in front of it.
Hiding the structure behind trees or large shrubs can make it seem more private, especially if it’s reached by a journey through the garden via a charming garden path.
If you don’t have enough space for a building, you can try putting a seat in an arbor next to the boundary. It will have a similar effect.
16. OPT FOR A COVER UP
Garden shade and garden screening can mean the same thing. A sail shade hung over a seating area will not only block views from upper-story windows, but will also provide protection from sunlight and rain.
To make the frame feel more enclosed, you can add climbers. Make sure the climbers will be tall enough to cover the frame, and attaching wires to the uprights for the stems to cling to.
WHAT PLANTS MAKE THE BEST PRIVACY SCREENS?
Try putting raised garden beds around the edge of your yard. Filled with tall plants like bamboo, ornamental grasses, and Carex pendula, they will create privacy naturally. Like net curtains, they will provide a screen between you and the outside world without casting too much shade.
