ideas for front garden?

Hi all,

I'm new to this forum and am an enthusistic but inexperienced gardener!!

At the moment I'm looking for plants for the front garden. We have a long frontage laid to gravel with a wall about 3 or 4 ft at the end. It's all very bare and i'd like to add some greenery in front of the wall to provide some privacy and colour and also to help mute some of the road noise.

Has anyone got any ideas for fast growing, hardy evergreen plants/trees shrubs that I could use?

Thanks
Feline

 

Hi Feline,
I might be a bit biassed but I'd recommend a look at Hebes. My garden is full of them, all different shapes and sizes, beautiful foliage and even more so when in flower. evergreen, fast growing and very difficult to kill, my perfect plant.
DART

 

A classic plant for screening & muting noise is Evergreen Prunus laurocerasus (cherry laurel) or you could go for an Evergreen rhododendron &/or Evergreen Magnolia or even Holly. Hebes are fine but unless you prune them correctly the larger ones tend to get leggy & sprawly, also they don't tend to grow that tall. How big do you want your screening plants to get? Also bear in mind the quicker growing they are, the more likely it is you will have to keep on top of them to restrict their size!

 

Thanks

I'd like them to grow to about 6 foot. I don't mind the trimming and shaping.

We're hoping to sell next year so I'm going to plant them inpots so we can take them with us.
Hopefully they'll also brightene up the front of the house which is very bare at the moment.

I have several hebe's in the back garden and i love them - they seem to grow despite my inexperienced gardening!!