Our top 4 hedging plants

If you are looking to hire a selection of plants for an event at your school or college, our new series of blogs have been written to showcase some of the inspiring and unique examples waiting for you at our nursey. Whether you are looking to screen event facilities or dress a marquee, match the green spaces your students and parents enjoy elsewhere within your grounds with our plants.

Our School & College Plant Hire Service is designed to rapidly meet your requirements, creating an instant impact, making your life easier, providing expert advice and guidance, and efficiently reducing your turn around time. We deliver directly to you and collect. Reassuringly all our plants are Plant Healthy certified. If our blogs inspire you, then do contact us – we’d love to arrange a meeting at our nursery to discuss how we can help you.

Prunus lusitanica (Laurel)

Very hardy evergreen shrub or small tree with glossy, dark green leaves and white fragrant flowers in summer, followed by black berries. Clip once or twice a year to maintain shape. Very easy to grow, sun or shade, any soil except a bog. 

They have a fantastic formal appearance as hedging and it forms a dense, thick hedge when properly pruned, providing privacy and an attractive appearance. We recommend spacing the plants about 1 to 3 feet (30 to 90 cm) apart when creating a hedge.

Fagus sylvatica (Beech)

Elliptic leaves emerging as a soft green and changing to russet before they finally fall in autumn. It’s the go to option for traditional, neatly clipped hedging. The sophisticated accompanying hedge for most surroundings and it benefits from holding on to its leaves further into the winter months. Smart and classic. Also excellent as large clipped shapes and statement pieces or gatekeepers.

Elaeagnus x ebbingei (Fragrant Mouseberry)

For formal evergreen hedging these are perfect. They may not be as posh as Holm Oak and they’ll need clipping more often than Holm Oak but they’ll do the job quicker and cheaper than anything else. When using for a stilted hedge (a hedge on legs) we plant about 1.6 metres apart – never more if you can help it. If you clip 4 times a year (remember that when it comes to topiary, the more often you clip, the sooner you’ll get what you want) you should have them all joined up and looking nice and dense and finished in less than 4 years from planting.

Unfussy about soil as long as it’s not waterlogged. Best in plenty of light but not essential.

Taxus baccata (Yew)

A native European tree, more often seen clipped as a hedge and as topiary. Because it’s native, it’s been used for centuries and is probably considered the poshest of all plants for topiary.

It’s incredibly tough, perfect for hedging and can grow in sun or shade.