More Bower and Pergola Chat

Nan over at Gardening Gone Wild was talking about a Arch Arbor which brought to mind our Arch Arbor. So this is how our Wooden Arch Arbor came to be. Several years ago we put this cedar screen at the end of our patio. I wanted to stop your eyes from seeing all the garden on this side when you looked out this way from the patio and I wanted to stop people from looking at us as we are seated on our patio when they drive by. This is how it looked when I first put it in. This is one of those trellises that you are supposed to mount on a wall. I wanted it to be the wall so I drove some of those metal fence posts in the ground at the appropriate places and wired the trellis to them. From the patio side you could never see those stakes and now the Lonicera and Clematis that grow on this trellis have made a wall in itself. No one has ever mentioned the stakes so they are well hidden. After I got this up I decided I wanted to guide people from our back door into the garden through a nice arch that matched the trellis. I had been pining over a nice wooden arch arbor for some time . I came up with this scheme when finally my Dearly Beloved had had enough of the whining, I mean pining. You see I kept telling him I could build one if if could figure out how to calculate the arch. Well, he told me to just give him the dimensions and he would figure it out for me and by golly he did.

Not only is he good at math he can wield a post hole digger like a professional. You can see that he had the proper supervision, our past gardening companion Mishka. Mishka always liked to be in the middle of the action.

As you can imagine I was shocked at the cost of the cedar but it had to match the screen at the end of the patio since they are nearly side by side.

The sides of the arch were made to look like the panel that is at the end of the patio. We added the side trellis after we got it put together. I don't know if it would have been easier to put it all together at once but I can tell you this. It was heavy and awkward to jostle into place as it was.

I have threatened to make a couple more of the arches. I could make 3 of them out of treated lumber for what we paid for the cedar to make this one. The cost of cedar is outrageous here. Redwood is even more expensive.

Having several other wooden arch arbors is another of those 'winter dreaming' schemes.

This all looks so much different now that the plants have settled in.

The Lonicera is so thick that nothing will grow on the back side of the screen. I have planted a climbing hydrangea at the sunny side of the arch but it is taking its time growing up the arch. I got so impatient with the hydrangea that I planted a jackamanii clematis with it to have a little color while the hydrangea moseys up the arch. Below you can see how it looked this past spring. I think I have shown this photo before but it is one of my favs because I like to look out my back door and see this lonicera strewing its petals on the patio. Sometimes it looks like someone frosted this area with orange frosting.

You can see that the Climbing Hydrangea is still sitting low on the arch arbor. It has sat there for about 4 years. I am normally a patient person regarding the garden but this thing is testing me. I have read many times that these climbing hydrangeas just grow and take over...well I am still waiting with my Felcos poised to try to tame it...in my dreams.