Topiary & Ornamental Hedging in Godstone

Topiary in Godstone

Box, yew and privet shapes clipped crisp for older village gardens and newer ones.

Topiary in Godstone tends to turn up in two kinds of garden. There are the older houses around the Green and in Church Town, where a pair of clipped yews or a box-edged path may well have been there for decades. And there are newer homes where someone has bought a couple of topiary balls for the front door and would like them to stay round.

Both need the same thing: regular trims through the growing season, usually three or four, done with a patient eye. Let a shape go for a whole summer and you spend the next year getting it back. It’s fiddly, unhurried work, and it’s the kind we enjoy.

Topiary in Godstone on free-draining soil

Yew does well on light, free-draining ground and clips beautifully, so it’s a good choice for bigger shapes in sandy village gardens. Box is more of a worry. Box blight and box tree caterpillar are both widespread now, and a plant already stressed by a dry summer on thin sand is less able to shrug either off. We check box at every visit, tell you honestly what we see and talk about alternatives if a plant’s on its way out. Topiary pruning is done in dry weather, too, since blight spreads on wet leaves.

Topiary shrubs in pots and by the door

Topiary shrubs in containers dry out quicker than anything in the ground, and in a hot spell they can scorch in days. We trim them back to shape, keep an eye on how they’re coping and flag any that need potting on. If you’d like a new shape trained from a shrub you already have, it can often be done over a few visits. Some plants take to it well and some don’t, and we’ll tell you which yours is before we start.

Topiary in Godstone: your questions

Anything else, just ring. You’ll speak to the people who do the work.

My box has gone brown in patches. What is it?

It could be box blight, which causes brown patches and bare stems, or box tree caterpillar, which leaves webbing and chewed leaves. Both are common now. We’ll take a look and tell you whether it’s worth saving.

How often do topiary balls need trimming?

Three or four times through the growing season keeps them crisp. Any fewer and they lose definition. We fit the trims into a regular visit so they don’t get missed.

Is yew a good replacement for box here?

Often, yes. It copes with light, well-drained soil, clips cleanly and makes good balls and cones. It’s slower to fill out, so it takes a bit of patience.