Topiary in the garden, do-it-yourself topiary, useful tips. Do-it-yourself topiary in the garden - step-by-step instructions on how to form and apply it in garden design (110 photo ideas) Making topiary with a simple geometric shape

If you seriously decide to take up topiary art and create several figures with your own hands, then you need to carefully approach the choice of plants for cutting. This choice determines whether you will get real topiary figures or not.

For an ideal topiary, the plant must have the following properties

1. High winter hardiness
2. Certain unpretentiousness to growing conditions
3. Ability to produce replacement shoots throughout life
4. Slow growth
5. Suitable crown shape

But, unfortunately, there are very few crops that have all the properties at once. Or more precisely, for each geographical zone it will have its own quantity and types. For example, in southern latitudes winter hardiness is not as important as in temperate climate. Accordingly, the number of suitable crops for topiary in the south is greater.

Winter hardiness is the main criterion

So, you opened the plant catalog to take a closer look at the requirements of some “persons” flora. If you haven't had the chance to live in South America, or at least in Sochi, or in the Crimea, then the first thing you should find out is: how the topiary “candidate” endures winter and what minimum temperature it can survive.

In addition, you need to know what the average minimum temperature is in your city or locality. You can check the weather archive. Search the Internet, there are several sites with weather archives. Choose yours locality and compare data for several winters, and then calculate the average temperature.

Or you can look on Wikipedia and find a description of your city. Nowadays, almost every description of any city in the text necessarily contains a “Climate” section, where the average minimum temperature of the area is indicated.

If it turns out that the temperature values ​​of your area differ significantly from the temperature regime of the plant itself, then it is better to immediately discard its candidacy and not waste time on further acquaintance with it. Otherwise, if you choose this type for topiary, you may simply lose it in the first winter.

But if you really like a certain look and you don’t want to give it up, then try to find people living at approximately the same latitude as you who are interested in topiary figures (the Internet and forums will help you). What if they already have experience growing your favorite plant?

Or another option is to create the topiary in a tub, so that during particularly cold months you can move it to an unheated room.

So if temperature regime If the plant allows you to grow it in your area, you should pay attention to other requirements, such as: lighting, moisture, soil type, fertilizing, as well as methods of shelter for the winter.

Plant shape

After you have chosen a crop suitable for your area, you should decide on the shape that can be given to it with a haircut. You need to focus on the very shape of the plant: its height, the shape of the crown, the size and shape of the leaves, the growth characteristics of the shoots, the presence of a leading shoot, the possibility of creating a trunk, etc. For example, if a plant has a pronounced cylindrical or conical shape, then it would be unwise to make a ball out of it.

For figures with clear edges, as well as for figures with the presence of small elements, species with a dense structure and small leaves, the growth rate of which is either slow or medium, are suitable. Such species will “keep their shape” well, and thanks to their restrained growth, this shape will be maintained longer, which will avoid frequent haircuts.

For round figures, as well as for various large figures, there are no such strict requirements, so almost any type that tolerates a haircut is suitable for them.

To make it easier for you to decide on your future topiary figure, we have compiled a table in which we indicate which crops are suitable for a particular form.

Plants for topiary figures table

Topiary as a species garden design, known since Ancient Rome. In the gardens of wealthy citizens one could see intricately trimmed trees and shrubs. Plants were given strict geometric shapes, patterns were cut out, and even figures of animals or birds were formed. Currently, the art of garden topiary is still at the height of fashion. In parks, public and private gardens, in city squares you can see not only neatly trimmed hedges, but also real works of art - green figures of people, animals, compositions of flowering sculptures.

In addition to the imagination and skill of the gardener, the successful result of creating a topiary huge role choosing the right plant plays a role. It must meet several requirements:

• respond well to a haircut;
• be unpretentious and winter-hardy;
• have the ability to actively form new shoots from dormant buds;
• grow slowly;
• grows well in the shade.

Many trees and shrubs meet these requirements. They can be divided into two groups: deciduous plants and conifers. Conifers grow more slowly, you will have to wait longer for the results of your work, but they are decorative all year round. From conifers to create garden sculptures fit:

• common and prickly spruce;
• thuja occidentalis;
• Cossack and common juniper;
• fir;
• boxwood;
• Siberian larch.

Deciduous plants for topiary:

• Tatarian maple and ginnala;
• apple (wild) and pear;
• small-leaved elm;
• small-leaved linden;
• barberry and Thunberga;
• vesicular carp;
• cotoneaster;
• hawthorn;
• euonymus;
• irga;
• spirea;
• golden currant.

Whatever the gardener's choice, the plant must be healthy. As a rule, the formation of the necessary forms begins no earlier than the tree is five years old. By this time it will have formed a well-developed root system and will quickly recover after a haircut.

Basic rules for creating topiary

There are clipped and frame topiaries. The first ones are simpler; even a beginner can create them. Plants are given simple shapes by shearing:

• pyramidal,
• spherical,
• cuboid.

Frame ones are more complex and allow you to create real green sculptures of animals, people and any objects (cars, houses, furniture). For such forms it is made metal carcass, inside which plants are planted. They fill the space of the frame; all unnecessary branches extending outwards are cut off. Small parts of the frame are filled with a mixture of peat and moss, where seedlings are planted, achieving the desired density and volume. It is not at all necessary to create a sculpture from one type of plant. The forms consisting of foliage of different shades and shapes look very picturesque. Often additionally planted in frame topiary blooming crops or cereals.

1. The haircut is carried out no more than 2 times per summer, removing no more than a third of the crown. The latest pruning is carried out no later than September. This way the plant will be able to regain its strength before wintering and will not get sick.
2. During the season, you need to give the necessary fertilizing to the seedlings.
3. Sometimes, if the crown is too thick, it is necessary to thin out the dense branches, letting light in. If this is not done, you can end up with bare areas - not receiving enough light, the branch will simply shed its foliage.
4. Be patient. Even to create simple geometric shapes takes at least 3 years.

Tools for work

For work, the gardener will need: a lopper, trellis shears, pruning shears, a level, wire and slats for constructing the frame, a template, and garden varnish for covering the cuts. All cutting tools must be sharp.

If you plan to arrange a topiary in the shape of a ball or other complex shape, you cannot do without making a template. Lines of the required shapes are drawn on a piece of cardboard or plywood, and the excess is cut off. For example, if you plan to trim the crown of a tree in the shape of a ball, then an arc of half a circle is drawn on the template, the right size. Interior the circle is removed.

When working with a seedling, the template is applied vertically to the crown, and all shoots extending beyond it are cut off. Here it is important to hold the template evenly relative to the vertical so that the ball is formed on all sides without distortion.

You can make a template for a spherical topiary from wire. An arc of the desired shape and size is bent from it, and small hooks are bent at the ends. The lower end is attached (not tightly!) to the trunk of the seedling from below, the upper hook of the template clings to the central vertical branch (if there is one). Carefully guide the template in a circle around the plant, extra shoots cut off.

For more complex shapes, the wire frame is bent directly around the seedling. Sometimes a metal or plastic flexible mesh is used, securing it over the main frame. If you paint it in advance in the color of the tree’s crown, it will become completely invisible.

The grid greatly facilitates the work when creating a green sculpture.

Step-by-step instructions for creating a pyramid-shaped topiary

1. Select a healthy, well-developed plant with a dense crown (thuja, larch, barberry, yew), at least 5 years old.
2. An even triangle is drawn on the ground around the seedling - this is the future base of the pyramid.
3. Even long blocks are installed at the vertices of the triangle. Their ends are tied together at the top of the “pyramid”. The frame of the future topiary is ready.
4. First, with a lopper, then with scissors and pruning shears, they begin to cut off the branches protruding beyond the frame. They form even corners and a top, then level the planes. To make it easier to align the sides of the pyramid, periodically apply a wide, even strip to the end bars.
5. When finished, remove the template.

During the season, the sculpture is regularly trimmed, giving the edges clarity. All the beauty of geometric shapes in plants is in their smooth and straight lines. The slightest carelessness and crookedness is noticeable and ugly.

Huge topiary trees in the garden of Crates Castle (Srathes Castle), Aberdeenshire, Scotland

Topiary (topiary) - decorative, figuredly trimmed trees and shrubs. To create topiary, upright evergreen shrubs or subshrubs with many small dense leaves or needles are used. Topiaries look very impressive and will always be the center of attention, whether they are growing in the garden or placed in planters, decorating a patio, entrance or terrace

HISTORY OF TOPIARY

Topiary has its origins in the gardens of the Roman Empire. In Pliny the Elder's massive work Natural History (the most valuable source of information about the culture, history and natural science of ancient Rome surviving from the 1st century), the credit for creating the first neatly trimmed tree is attributed to Caesar's courtier named Calvena. Topiary plants quickly became widespread in the atriums of Roman villas, where they were used to create bizarre landscapes of geometric shapes and animals. The gardeners responsible for creating such landscapes were called topiaries. With the expansion of the Roman Empire, the tradition of topiary spread throughout Europe.

In medieval European sources illustrating church life, there are often images of neatly trimmed plants and hedges of varying heights surrounding flower beds and vegetable gardens in monastery gardens. In the subsequent era of the Italian Renaissance, gardening and landscape art began to flourish. The sophisticated formal designs of the time sought to replicate in the garden the patterns of domestic tapestries, rugs, prints and stuccoes (read more about this in the article Garden Styles in History). Topiaries were an absolutely integral part of these designs and were widely used to create long promenades and labyrinths popular at the time, as tapeworms, and also in the form of endless hedges of different heights bordering a variety of flower beds and potagers (ornamental vegetable gardens). Examples of such gardens are perfectly preserved and are still maintained in in its original form(for example, Versailles and its numerous imitations, the gardens of the Hampton Court ensemble in England and others).

With the rise of classicism, the art of topiary began to fade and fell into complete decline by the middle of the 18th century. The English park style, for which topiary is a completely alien element, is coming into fashion, and the artistic trimming of trees and shrubs is disappearing from landscape practice for a whole century. It is curious that at this time topiary continued to be cultivated in Britain." ordinary people" in practical and natural cottage gardens, where they were a rather unusual and conspicuous decorative object among vegetables, fruit trees, aromatic herbs and simple “country” flowers.

At the beginning of the 20th century, pragmatic Americans made a simple but very useful invention. They came up with a woven wire frame of a curly shape that fits over young plant. The shrub grows and develops in this frame, and when young shoots begin to extend beyond the frame, pruning is done along its borders.

Nowadays, the art of topiary has become a classic of garden design and is no longer subject to the “fashionable” criterion. In modern informal garden designs, with their naturalness, asymmetry and slight clutter, topiaries add structure and add eye-catching contrast.

The most popular form of topiary at all times remains, undoubtedly, standard trees and trees. In standard culture, not only plants are grown - traditional favorites for topiary, but also any subshrubs. Elegant standard trees are not at all easy to grow and require close attention for several years until they reach the desired state. This explains their high price in stores.

PLANTS MOST SUITABLE FOR CREATING TOPIARY

BOX EVERGREEN (Buchus sempervirens) is an undemanding shrub that grows to 2 m or more under suitable conditions. Grows well in both sun and partial shade. There are variegated forms (Variegata). Boxwood needs haircuts twice a year. In colder climate zones (zone 5 and further north) to preserve decorative appearance needs something easy winter shelter. Be careful, the plant is poisonous!

HOLLY, or holly (Ilech spp.) – frost-resistant and slow-growing, hollies need pruning no more than once a year (which can be both an advantage and a disadvantage of a plant for creating topiary). We wrote in detail about hollies in a special article Holly - a January plant. Additional benefits of holly: it tolerates partial shade and even full shade, there are especially beautiful shapes with colorful leaves, showy berries in red, black or yellow color, there are self-pollinating forms. The difficulties of the work include the fact that the plant is very prickly.

TISS (Takhus spp.) is a frost-resistant shrub with dense needles and round red berries that look great against the backdrop of dark greenery. The most popular type used for creating hedges is the berry variety (T. bazzata). There are forms with yellow needles. Yews are renowned for their longevity and hardiness: they can grow in full shade and tolerate transplanting well. The plant grows quite quickly, so it will require two trimmings per year. Be careful, many parts of the plant are extremely poisonous!

PRIVET (Ligustrum spp.). A fast-growing shrub that requires regular pruning - a couple of times during the warm season. Most common in Europe b. ovalifolia (L. ovalifolium), called here Hello, in middle lane Russia needs winter shelter when grown in open ground, because she may freeze. The most cold-resistant type of privet (up to zone 4) is b. common (L. vulgare).

COtoneaster (Cotoneaster spp.) – there are both evergreen and deciduous species. Additional attractiveness to cotoneasters is given by the red berries that ripen in autumn, the shades that the leaves of deciduous cotoneasters acquire, as well as the growth characteristics of different types(there are almost recumbent, arched, upright, highly branched varieties), which can be used for interesting ideas. Many cotoneasters are frost-resistant, unpretentious, tolerate haircuts well and grow back quickly.

BARBERIS (Berberis spp) – evergreen or deciduous thorny shrubs. Many barberries are very decorative, especially in the fall, when their berries ripen and their leaves turn purple. Barberries are unpretentious, grow well and tolerate haircuts easily.

LAUREL (Laurus nobilis) and other species are a popular plant for container topiary. The root system of the laurel is located high in the soil, so care for the plant should be carried out carefully and it is advisable to use mulching.

Thuya (Thuya spp.) – unpretentious coniferous plant, lends itself well to cutting and grows back quickly. Haircut is recommended twice a year.

TSUGA (Hemlock spp) is an evergreen, shade-tolerant and fairly winter-hardy tree from the pine family.

Weeping forms of IVA (Salih integra, etc.) are especially well suited for creating a standard form.

OLIVE (Olea europaea) – this plant is extremely fashionable in Lately. Usually grown in the form of a standard. Cold resistance - from zone 7; in cold regions the plant should overwinter in a cool room. In addition, the plant is hardy, drought-resistant and not at all difficult to care for.

HOW TO CREATE TOPIARY

Making topiary is a fun and creative endeavor that requires a clear vision, a steady hand, as well as patience, time and work. Complex, sophisticated shapes and large plant specimens usually require years of careful work by an experienced professional topiary gardener. However, simple forms are quite within the power of enthusiastic amateurs, provided they have the good tool, time, patience and accuracy. You can also make your task easier by using the special metal frames mentioned above, which are available in garden centers.
If you really want to decorate your garden or house with a green figure, but there is no way to create real topiary, try to cheat. Plant ivy (Hedera spp) or other climbing plant with small leaves in a pot and install a metal frame of the desired shape. Under favorable conditions, ivy will literally cover the frame in one season and begin to resemble an elegant topiary plant.

If you are a beginner topiary, then let your first masterpiece be one of the simplest topiary shapes - a hemisphere, cone or cube. After practicing on simple forms, you can more confidently proceed to more complex options spirals, as well as artistic or multi-element figures. When growing topiary in tubs, you should pay attention to the combination of container and plant shape. So, rounded topiaries (balls, hemispheres) look better in square tubs, while cone-shaped ones look better in regular straight ones.

Well-rooted, strong and healthy plants are suitable for creating topiary. Start with small haircuts, carefully shaping the crown of the plant and gradually approaching the intended appearance.

Topiary, as a type of garden design, has been known since the times of Ancient Rome. In the gardens of wealthy citizens one could see intricately trimmed trees and shrubs. Plants were given strict geometric shapes, patterns were cut out, and even figures of animals or birds were formed. Currently, the art of garden topiary is still at the height of fashion. In parks, public and private gardens, in city squares you can see not only neatly trimmed hedges, but also real works of art - green figures of people, animals, compositions of flowering sculptures.

In addition to the imagination and skill of the gardener, the choice of a suitable plant plays a huge role in the successful result of creating a topiary. It must meet several requirements:

• respond well to a haircut;
• be unpretentious and winter-hardy;
• have the ability to actively form new shoots from dormant buds;
• grow slowly;
• grows well in the shade.

Many trees and shrubs meet these requirements. They can be divided into two groups: deciduous plants and conifers. Conifers grow more slowly and you will have to wait longer for the results of your work, but they are decorative all year round. The following conifers are suitable for creating garden sculptures:

• common and prickly spruce;
• thuja occidentalis;
• Cossack and common juniper;
• fir;
• boxwood;
• Siberian larch.

Deciduous plants for topiary:

• Tatarian maple and ginnala;
• apple (wild) and pear;
• small-leaved elm;
• small-leaved linden;
• barberry and Thunberga;
• vesicular carp;
• cotoneaster;
• hawthorn;
• euonymus;
• irga;
• spirea;
• golden currant.

Whatever the gardener's choice, the plant must be healthy. As a rule, the formation of the necessary forms begins no earlier than the tree is five years old. By this time, it will have formed a well-developed root system and will quickly recover after cutting.

Basic rules for creating topiary

There are clipped and frame topiaries. The first ones are simpler; even a beginner can create them. Plants are given simple shapes by shearing:

• pyramidal,
• spherical,
• cuboid.

Frame ones are more complex and allow you to create real green sculptures of animals, people and any objects (cars, houses, furniture). For such forms, a metal frame is made, inside which plants are planted. They fill the space of the frame; all unnecessary branches extending outwards are cut off. Small parts of the frame are filled with a mixture of peat and moss, where seedlings are planted, achieving the desired density and volume. It is not at all necessary to create a sculpture from one type of plant. The forms consisting of foliage of different shades and shapes look very picturesque. Often, additional flowering crops or cereals are planted in a frame topiary.

1. The haircut is carried out no more than 2 times per summer, removing no more than a third of the crown. The latest pruning is carried out no later than September. This way the plant will be able to regain its strength before wintering and will not get sick.
2. During the season, you need to give the necessary fertilizing to the seedlings.
3. Sometimes, if the crown is too thick, it is necessary to thin out the dense branches, letting light in. If this is not done, you can end up with bare areas - not receiving enough light, the branch will simply shed its foliage.
4. Be patient. Even creating simple geometric shapes takes at least 3 years.

Tools for work

For work, the gardener will need: a lopper, trellis shears, pruning shears, a level, wire and slats for constructing the frame, a template, and garden varnish for covering the cuts. All cutting tools must be sharp.

If you plan to arrange a topiary in the shape of a ball or other complex shape, you cannot do without making a template. Lines of the required shapes are drawn on a piece of cardboard or plywood, and the excess is cut off. For example, if you plan to trim the crown of a tree in the shape of a ball, then an arc of half a circle of the required size is drawn on the template. The inner part of the circle is removed.

When working with a seedling, the template is applied vertically to the crown, and all shoots extending beyond it are cut off. Here it is important to hold the template evenly relative to the vertical so that the ball is formed on all sides without distortion.

You can make a template for a spherical topiary from wire. An arc of the desired shape and size is bent from it, and small hooks are bent at the ends. The lower end is attached (not tightly!) to the trunk of the seedling from below, the upper hook of the template clings to the central vertical branch (if there is one). Carefully guiding the template in a circle around the plant, cut off the excess shoots.

For more complex shapes, the wire frame is bent directly around the seedling. Sometimes a metal or plastic flexible mesh is used, securing it over the main frame. If you paint it in advance in the color of the tree’s crown, it will become completely invisible.

The grid greatly facilitates the work when creating a green sculpture.

Step-by-step instructions for creating a pyramid-shaped topiary

1. Select a healthy, well-developed plant with a dense crown (thuja, larch, barberry, yew), at least 5 years old.
2. An even triangle is drawn on the ground around the seedling - this is the future base of the pyramid.
3. Even long blocks are installed at the vertices of the triangle. Their ends are tied together at the top of the “pyramid”. The frame of the future topiary is ready.
4. First, with a lopper, then with scissors and pruning shears, they begin to cut off the branches protruding beyond the frame. They form even corners and a top, then level the planes. To make it easier to align the sides of the pyramid, periodically apply a wide, even strip to the end bars.
5. When finished, remove the template.

During the season, the sculpture is regularly trimmed, giving the edges clarity. All the beauty of geometric shapes in plants is in their smooth and straight lines. The slightest carelessness and crookedness is noticeable and ugly.

The ideal way to show the world your own Creative skills and to assert oneself is the creation of garden figures and sculptures. You don't have to graduate as an artist or be an advanced designer to do this. A little imagination proper care and trimming plants will soon provide your garden with a park of exotic animals and green sculptures that vaguely resemble the appearance and shape of your beloved woman.

From Gurzuf to Kamchatka we will trim the bushes smoothly

Curly pruning of bushes and trees, as an art, has its roots, literally and figuratively, going back to the times of the Roman Empire. The first element in the form of a cube or ball, cut by the deft hands of a gardener, was the godfather of garden topiary.

Most beautiful garden plots Now it is impossible to imagine without original and expressive figures in the form of geometric volumes, architectural structures or funny animals. Today, the fashion for topiary from flowers or plants is at its peak. But to master the techniques and techniques of a curly haircut, you will need patience and imagination, as well as love and time.

The first timid attempts to create something similar in Gurzuf Park were clumsy and inexpressive. Something was missing when creating the figures: either the gardener was afraid to cut off the excess, or he lacked wild imagination and the embodiment of his ideas. If you fully possess all these qualities, or strive to acquire them, then this type of gardening art is for you!

But the imagination of newly minted topiary gardeners knows no bounds at the dachas and landscape areas. Today, magnificent figures can be seen not only in boring Jurassic parks. How to become a real toriarian?

Topiary techniques or how to make a green beast

There are several techniques for creating topiary. These are frameless and frame technologies.

frameless technology

Frameless technology is based on manual trimming of shrubby plants with garden shears. With frameless technology, the accuracy of cutting and the creation of the required volume depends on the skill and skill of the gardener. With frameless technology, you should choose suitable plant so that the possibility of an overgrown crown influences the choice of the shape of the desired figure. This largely depends on the type of plant and the density of the foliage, its length and the shape of the leaves. Let us tell you that to create a beautiful topiary or hedge, it is preferable to use thuja, boxwood, privet (Ligustrim) and conifers.

every gardener wants to know

Not all plants and shrubs are suitable for creating topiary. These should be plants with hard and fast-growing leaves, such as thuja and boxwood. Thuja is a genus of evergreens coniferous trees and shrubs of small height of the cypress family. There are several types of thuja that are suitable for creating topiary.

Boxwood is also a representative of evergreen shrubs and has about 40 species. Boxwood is a shrub up to 12 m high with densely leafy shoots. Sessile leaves are different sizes. Boxwood is planted in the spring and when rooting, the first cutting of the leaves is carried out. With timely watering and spraying of the bush, it does not stop the growth of shoots, which ensures a dense green crown.

Privet is a genus of shrubby plants in the olive family and has 40 species.

Used for sculptures and figures climbing plants, namely: akebia quintuple, common ivy, round-leaved tree pliers, tripointed and five-leafed maiden vine. The duration of green cover is determined by the climate of the area and the variety of plant for topiary with the possibility of wintering.

Helpful tips: choosing plants for topiary

To create shapes and sculptures with your own hands, it is better to give preference to plants with small leaves, which are capable of forming replacement shoots throughout the growing season. It’s not bad if there are a lot of living dormant buds on the branch, ready for subsequent foliage growth. Now it's up to the right choice tool for cutting plants.

hair cutting tool

A real topiary workshop should have in its arsenal a powerful tool - a tool for cutting foliage. What criteria should you use to select a cutting tool?

For daily care of figures and shrub sculptures, you will need a minimum set of tools, which is represented by sharpened trellis (garden) scissors, pruning shears (straight and side), a lopper and a saw.

Care using tools involves regular leveling of the crown and cutting off growing shoots according to the meaning of the plant. In addition, care involves watering and feeding the plant.

frame technology

The frame technique is fundamentally different from a curly haircut.

Having mastered the technique, you can confidently answer the question: “How to make topiary with your own hands.” IN frame technology topiary relies on the technique of filling the frame of a figure with a soil mixture and then planting vegetation in the frame.

The process of creating a figure or sculpture consists of the following stages:

Selecting the location of the figure and plant

Creating a layout and wire frame

Filling the frame with soil mixture

Planting vegetation in a filled frame.

The basis of topiary frame is a homemade or purchased ready-made wire frame. Using the frame, they create complex sculptural forms and tiny tabletop compositions.

Any step-by-step topiary using the frame technique begins with a sketch of a wire frame and embodies the idea in a cardboard model. Layout will allow you to make adjustments to the image of the sculpture and eliminate modeling errors.

frame anatomy

The anatomy of the frame must correspond to the design of the figure. Let us tell you that if a hare is planned, then the emphasis must be increased on the long ears, and if it is an elephant, then on the trunk and tail. The long hind legs of a hare are anatomically completely unsuitable for an elephant and vice versa. There is also a new feature in topiary – animals with lamps.

Imagine a lynx or a tiger standing on two hind legs and holding a lamp in the front. Therefore, all the dynamics of the green beast will have to be conveyed in the frame.

Then the frame of the mold is assembled from the wire, taking into account the possibilities of layering until three-dimensionality is formed. At the intersection points, the wire is secured by welding, ensuring the stability of the sculpture. The finished frame is braided with a mesh with cells no larger than 10 mm.

Helpful tips: collecting soil for filling

The soil mixture for the contents of the frame is carefully selected. In one container, mix the nutrient mixture and soil, consisting of leaf soil, turf and the top layer of peat. Then finely chopped straw is added to the resulting mass. Thanks to the presence of straws and the moistening of the soil mixture, the latter will not spill out of the frame. The mixture is then made into balls and placed in a frame container.

How to fill the frame with soil is shown here.

landscaping filling

The final stage of creating a frame topiary is landscaping the filler. The filler is populated with plants in the order in which they will subsequently grow. This means that the “culture” is first planted, and then the lawn. For example, to create an imitation of the skin of a lion, initially sprouted seeds were infused into the soil mixture, and then for the mane, a lawn mixture with long stems was added.

Let us tell you that filling the frame with landscaping begins with small details - tail, ears, beak and limbs. The planting technology is as follows: make a hole in a lump of mixture with a sharp object to a depth that will accommodate seeds or plants with roots.

After such an injection, the depression is sealed and compacted with moss.

Each frame figure is equipped with support posts and platforms, thanks to which the frame, filled with soil mixture, stands stably in a designated place.

To make it easier to maintain the structure, a drip irrigation system is designed and installed. The tubes are placed along the frame for uniform watering, making it easier to care for the original and picturesque object of a country plot - the topiary.