The Golden State: Where & How to Live, Secure, Visit, Enjoy and Thrive in California
15 Basic Ways To Landscape Your Homepage
Fences
FENCES NO LONGER are ill-designed barriers to keep the neighbor's pets or children from invading your yard.
New fences serve more pleasing functions and have become an integral part of the home and landscape. Full advantage is being taken of t he many possibilities fences offer in providing boundary divisions, screens for privacy and weather controls.
Fences also serve as attractive backgrounds for plants and are used as an important element of design. As enclosures and divisions of outdoor space, fences permit the full enjoyment of practical outdoor living. Careful thought should be given to the material used. Bear in mind that your fence should not only harmonize with its surroundings but should combine decorative design with practical usage.
Board fences, either horizontal or verticil, usually provide the best screens for privacy. The basketweave fence is equally attractive on either side. Often it can be constructed in cooperation with your neighbor.
Built horizontally, the basketweave pattern is always pleasing and its horizontal lines make it seem less forbidding. I hese fences are rather complicated in design but their construction is fairly simple. They make comparatively strong barriers and help to keep out most intruders.
Fences do not necessarily have to follow boundary lines of your property. They may zig-zag or curve to furnish interesting designs and patterns. In many instances you can create an illusion of more space than you actually have by providing setbacks within your property boundary.
French hand-riven chestnut or redwood palings, pointed at the top and closely woven are ideal for privacy screens. This type of fence is durable and economical, requires little maintenance, cannot be seen through and blends with many landscapes.
The rustic picket or grapestake fence is widely used in many sections of the country as a solid, decorative, informal or formal enclosure of space and privacy.
Fences used as weather controls help to modify sun, wind and frost. The basket-weave, board-and-board or louver fences filter the sun's rays and admit air to areas which otherwise would be closed off by a solid fence or thick hedge.
The board-and-board type of fence, also called shadow fence, is built with boards nailed to a frame with an open space, often narrower than the board, between them. Other boards are then nailed to the opposite side with open spaces left opposite boards on the other side. Boards can be used either horizontally or vertically.
Louver fences require careful design relating to the architectural style of the house. They are often used as an extension of the house itself, joining the garage, carport or outdoor room.
Closely placed slats or fences with slanting baffle on top help control wind. Frost protection to tome extent is provided by fences with openings which permit cold air to flow out from where it might otherwise he trapped and damage plants.
