While some gardens, with all their floral splendor and sophisticated garden architecture and landscape planning, are aimed at aesthetically delighting onlookers or enriching the visual appeal of the house itself, other home and garden owners long for seclusion and tranquil silence. In many cases, a living privacy screen can do things that a privacy screen made of stones, pallets or other dead materials cannot.
What is a living privacy screen and what variants are there?
A living screen provides privacy, protection from wind and improves the garden microclimate. Possible variations include flowering shrubs, climbing plants, perennials or annual flowers. They are aesthetically pleasing and provide habitat for insects and birds.
Possible variants for a living privacy screen in the garden
In some suburban settlements, evergreen hedges made up of plants such as Thuja occidentalis 'Brabant', cherry laurel or easily growing coniferous trees such as spruces "reign" at the property boundaries these days. Other plants can also be considered for natural privacy protection, which are also aesthetically attractive and offer nesting and feeding opportunities for many animal species:
- Privacy hedges made of flowering bushes
- Privacy screen made from various climbing plants
- Blooming perennials as privacy screens
- Annual flowers as a fast-growing and blooming privacy screen
In any case, living privacy hedges can have a positive influence on the microclimate in the garden through their shadows and at the same time provide valuable habitats for endangered insect and bird species.
Make the terrace even more comfortable with a living privacy screen
A place to celebrate, relax and enjoy on your own terrace is not necessarily perfect for the outdoor area with the right lounge furniture (€381.00 at Amazon). The atmosphere on the terrace becomes really cozy on long summer evenings when it is a clearly demarcated place in the garden area where you are not constantly surrounded by absolute darkness. In addition, a suitable privacy screen on the terrace not only creates a more cozy atmosphere, but also effectively blocks cool gusts of wind. Last but not least, the privacy protection options chosen for a terrace can also be part of the overall design in the garden. For example, plant troughs with trellises and ivy growth can protect the terrace from neighbors' views as standard, but can also easily be placed next to the swimming pool as a windbreak when the wind is cool in the spring and autumn seasons.
Small but nice: a living privacy screen on the balcony
For many people, their own balcony is not only the living room extended out into the great outdoors, but also the only space for gardening experiments and fields of activity. Many apartment owners get correspondingly creative when it comes to “building” their own balcony boxes and plant pots. Due to the relevant regulations, usually only small flowers and sometimes climbing plants are permitted and desired for cultivation on a balcony. However, numerous interesting privacy protection ideas for the balcony can also be realized with compact plant species.
Tip
While stone walls only change visually very slightly over the course of the season, plants can go through absolutely contrasting stages, from bare branches to fresh green needles. In many cases, a living privacy screen makes the constant change and eternal cycle of nature in the garden more tangible than a privacy wall made of wood or other materials.
