Taper And Train Your Topiary S ince the days of the ancient Romans, the art of topiary gardening has been cultivated for both its aesthetic and practical benefits. Although Europeans have used this method of growing and training plants for centuries, topiaries became popular in the United States as a means of architecturally transforming the limited spaces of urban homes and gardens. The most common topiary forms include espalier, hedge, sculptural and standard. The espalier, one of the most familiar artistic forms, is a plant, which is grown flat, like a vine, against a wall, fence building or trellis.
Fruit trees make excellent espaliers, as they are both productive and pretty in leaf and flower.
From an architectural point of view, espaliers are particularly useful in concealing a utility area or creating a privacy screen without closing off the garden from light and air. Hedges, the quintessential topiary form, are rows of shrubs or trees that are evenly spaced into a solid line and pruned so that they are wider at their base than at their top. Traditionally, hedges provide a formal look. However, for a natural looking landscape, they can easily be pruned into forms that recreate inspiring or desirable shapes seen in the wild. The most imaginative and arresting topiary form is sculptural.