How Do I Choose A Fence Style?

One of the hardest parts of your home fence is to pick the right fence style to suit your needs and landscape. Take the time to look at your neighborhood's array of fences for suggestions. Home magazines and online photos will also help you develop a broad-angle lens for your fencing choices. There are several attractive choices for choosing whether you want anonymity, a picket or a border fence. 

 

Factors to Consider Before Choosing the Right Fence 

 

• Gain Privacy. Choose a fence with little to no room between boards if you want true confidentiality. When paired with the lush foliage of trailing plants, a tightly spaced grid can be almost as private as a solid material. The height will depend on the slope of your yard, the location of your seats, and all related building codes for your neighbour's yard. Try the height of the fence you think is using a paper or cardboard length and have a buddy stand it on your yard perimeter. Only sit up and see if the fence is high enough to fulfill the privacy requirements.

• Consider going gateless. If you are concerned with easy access rather than protection, consider fully abandoning the gate and installing several offset cabinets to make way for a path while blocking road views, as shown here.

• Consider a stepped design. If it seems like too much to get a tall privacy fence all the way around your yard, consider going for a stair-step style to get privacy only where you need it. For instance, you might have a taller section of fence around your seating area and hot tub, and lower fencing beside the lawn.

• Shield Wind. The best choice is glass, as seen at this incredible rooftop patio, if you have to block strong wind, but do not want to lose sight — or a great view. If it's not an issue to obstruct the view, any data security fence with little to no gaps would work well. For height, bear in mind that the closing might be a few steps lower than around an area where people stand, like around the grill, if you mainly need to keep a wind out of a sitting area.

• Feel Secure.  A taller height, a lack of grip areas, and a solid, lockable door are the most important features for a security fence. Any safety fence is at least 8 feet tall, but for safety it doesn't look so intimidating to place a few feet of trellis on the top of a 6 foot fence. Choose a fence with flush boards and no horizontal rails on the outside to avoid possible intruders.

• Block a Street View.  If your house is on a busy street, the right fence starts to create a quiet backyard space. If you would like to allow a certain amount of light, pick a fence between boards (or even a lattice-like design) and lush plantations in layers on both sides to ensure additional privacy. Or, as seen here, try a frosting glass style. It may be beneficial, as with privacy fencing, to measure the fence height before committing.

• Keep Your Dogs In.  Knowing your dogs is the first move. Aren't they jumpers or excavators? How high can they jump, how high can they? Do you probably try to leave your yard, or do you usually like hanging out? For smaller dogs or someone that don't run, it may be a 3- to 4-foot fence; larger dogs require more effort. If your dogs are diggers, bury at least 6 inches under the fence or rough the fence.

• Consider blocking visual stimuli with a solid fence. While almost any form of fence can hold your dog in a yard, consider investing in a solid fence to block your visual signals (cars, footballers, cats) to get things going if your dog is excited or loves to bark.

• Secure Your Pool. Even if you don't have children in your house, it's vital that you take precautions to protect your pool. Kids and relatives could go to your pool without your knowledge and neighbourhood children could attempt to sneak in your pool. Protected your yard (with a safety fence) and the pool itself on the safe side.