We love our patio. We spend a ton of time out there. We were able to pick up space heaters on clearance at Lowe’s back around Thanksgiving so we had even more functionality all winter. Just before football season last year, I was able to get a steal on a flat screen that we have mounted to the wall. Of course, when you have a flat screen you also need a soundbar, right? I picked up one of those on an open box special at Best Buy along with an iPod docking station that allows me to have music only should we want some tunes while we are in the pool. We have an “outdoor living room” set up along with a full size table where we eat almost all of our meals. The one thing we were lacking was total privacy.
In the picture to the right, you can see that we have neighbors behind us. While they are nice people, I don’t necessarily want them staring at us while we are in the pool or spending time on the patio. I decided that i needed to find a way to employ the things we like while also giving us the privacy we need. Part of planning any type of a landscape is knowing the growth properties of the plant material you choose. In our case, we didn’t need something that needed to grow 10 feet tall and in a hedgerow, we just needed to block strategic areas of our patio to supplement the privacy we were already getting from the large Live Oak tree directly behind the pool
Height is the first issue, but we like aesthetics. If you are going to plant for a theme, why not make it tropical? I choose to plant Hibiscus, Banana Trees and Foxtail Palms. I planted them in the back corner of the deck behind two of our lounge chairs. The cool part about this is that all of the chosen plant material grows very, very quickly. Also, because of it’s location, it will not interfered with our sunlight as the sun moves over the top of the house and will beat down directly on the lounge chairs. This will allow us to lay by the pool and enjoy our days without having to worry about whether or not we are being “spied on”. No, I am not a recluse, I am not some eccentric person that wears rubber gloves to touch everything and sprays door knobs with Windex. I simply like to have my privacy.
The best part of all of this is that I was able to get some “last chance” plants at Lowe’s to make this happen. I got my Banana Trees for $5.00 each and the Hibiscus and Foxtail Palms were only $3.99 on markdown. I have not problem buying plants that look to be on their last leg in the store. Not only is it a challenge to me, but I know that I can save them and treat them the right way so there is a feel good sense of accomplishment when I am done. I look forward to showing you the growth progress of this project in the coming months. I am willing to bet we will have our private corner no later than the 4th of July.
What types of things have you done to use plant material in an effort to create privacy for you and your family?
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