5 ideas for shaping your plants, shrubs and trees

Many plants can be molded into distinctive shapes with the use of special pruning techniques.

Perhaps you want to grow a tree-form standard, a wall-hugging espalier or an interesting topiary. Before you get started, make sure the plant you want to use is willing to cooperate.

• If it's already growing in your garden, analyze it from every angle and study the structure of its leaves, stems and flowers.
• Sculpted plants naturally draw attention, so it's often a good idea to grow companion plants that will help frame the finished specimen.
• When starting with a new plant, be sure to choose one that is the right size for the place and the project.

Even if you have a good eye for plant form, a template can help you maintain a perfectly clipped shape when you're pruning.

• To trim a globe, for example, make an arch of stiff wire of the size you need and attach it to the plant's crown.
• Clip away growth that falls outside the template, rotating it around the plant as you work.

• To encourage a tree or shrub that has a weeping growth habit to spread out in an open fashion, each year trim branches just above a shoot that points away from the crown.
• Pinch off buds that face upward or toward the centre of the crown.

When pruning a plant to grow as an upright column, don't prune the top or pinch back vertical stems; doing so will encourage the growth of lateral stems.

• Instead, prune the oblique stems to maintain the natural silhouette.

A standard is created by carefully pruning and training a shrub to grow into the shape of a small tree.

• Standards are often one metre tall, comprised of a single trunk with a knot of foliage and flowers at the top.
• They can be much smaller, however, and the little ones are effective in pots used as tabletop features. The top is often clipped into a sphere, cone or weeping shape.

Making a standard

To make a standard, select a shrub with at least one straight vertical stem. Prune off all other low-growing stems and tie the selected one to a durable stake.

• When the plant is tall enough, pinch off the tip to make the top bushy.
• As the top grows, shape it into the desired form by more pinching and pruning.
• Carefully remove all unwanted buds that sprout along the main stem or trunk.

Plants to use

Good plants for standards include fuchsia, rosemary, dwarf cherries and roses.

• To create a standard rose with a full top, grafting is necessary to increase the number of stems.

Show them off

• Because standards are unusual and eye-catching, they deserve a prominent place in the landscape.
• Use them to line a walkway or plant one on each side of a doorway, beside a gate or at both ends of a garden bench.

Feature a fine-figured trunk

A standard can be made with a braided trunk. This interesting effect can easily be created with three flexible Ficus benjamina plants grown in the same pot.

• When they are 38 to 46 centimetres tall, cut off all lateral branches and carefully braid the three stripped stems.
• As they grow, the stems will thicken and wind together to form a sturdy, handsome standard with a single trunk.
• Allow a bushy top to grow above the triple trunk.