Check out the Gallery. Under Messages on the Clematis forum, it says On Topic Discussions, then a link to Gallery.

And yes, clematis can work its way up a trellis in the middle of a bed. They can be quite attractive this way.

My husband built these two free standing trellises for me. Unfortunately, it was before I realized that Clematis don't climb the lattice on their own very well. In the future I'm going with wire. These are all 1 year old Type IIIs in heavily amended and worked soil from gallon pots.

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This is a garden windmill that broke. Ten year old Multi-Blue in lousy soil.

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Gazelle growing over a barberry

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Piilu on an obelisk in the middle of heather bed, it is triple that width right now. Grips metal really well on it's own.

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Polish Spirit spiraling up copper tubing on a crabapple tree

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Bijou has no support and neither does integrifolia and recta purpurea they are just planted in the garden. Please ignore weeds....

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Petite Faucon and Alionushka both got too big to drape over shrubs, PF actually killed a caryopteris last year. They are both caged in rusty wire cages now. That is Petite Faucon that looks like a column of green to the right of the tree trunk.

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I have more pics but can't find them right now, I have a free standing arbor in another flowerbed too.

Buyorsell, I am looking at a way to get my clematis into an apple tree and am interested in your use of copper tubing. Do all the vines go up one width of copper tubing or do you have several pieces of copper tubing winding around the tree?

Have you considered placing wire fencing in front or behind the lattice to give clematis a surface to wind on? I believe I saw a photo of wire fencing attached to a lattice fence.

Buyorsell, those are gorgeous! I especially like the one winding around the pole.

Michael, have you been to the convo side lately? It's mostly asking for plant i.d.'s, and it's kind of dead.

Buyorsell, I just remembered, I have an Obelisk not being used! I think I may put that one in the bed, but I'm afraid it may get too much sun there.

I used to grow Clematis years ago and was successful, but it's been so long I need a refresher course! :)

Full sun is generally desired and not a problem.

There is one piece of copper tubing from home improvement center. I tied the first few vines on and the rest are woven through. I did not hard prune Polish Spirit this year down to the ground, I wanted to keep the vines that were spiraling up in place and eventual flowering up in the tree.

One can use wire livestock fencing as well. See photo I posted on a thread about cedar trellises, I posted a photo of the fencing used to surround a 4 x 4 post for a birdhouse but that gardener had used it around all her trees too.

You could not really see the wire fencing, when I took the photos I was looking to show the fencing.

Rhapsody climbs up string attached to a bird house post.

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I built this clunky arbor a few years ago.

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The arbor looks a lot better covered in Betty Corning.

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Wow, Harry, that is impressive. I guess the string option would also work well on a mailbox...I have trouble getting Niobe to climb up on something at the mailbox. But maybe the string would not look so great in the off seasons in the front of the house?

The good thing about string is that it can be removed in fall.

I went to an open garden locally several times that had dozens of Clematis if not over 100. They used this wire fencing around at posts and trees. Not removable in winter because most of the Clems they had climbing were ones they would not prune to the ground. They probably had twenty bird feeders/houses up on these posts. No lawn. The yard was wood chip paths around all the beds. It was fabulous. Going to be open again in a couple of weeks and I can't wait to visit again. There were two and three varieties growing up each post and the Clems were obscuring the posts completely some were five feet wide around them. The garden is a Hemerocallis Society display garden too or was. I think she has retired from that now but as you can see she has a ton of daylilies.

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free standing wire trellises against garage wall

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I have a Jackmanii growing on the side of my porch, and up the side of the house. The idea was to hide the water meter from the front sidewalk as you walk up to the front porch/door. To get it to climb up my vinyl sided house, I hung a couple siding hooks and then hung a piece of wire fencing on the hooks. It is completely removeable this way and becuse the hooks just snap into the siding, the natural movement of the siding isn't impeded.

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Another shot showing the meter. When training it up the side of the house, I made sure to keep it off the meter so that the meter reader can still read the meter. Two years ago, I had Jackmanii growing up and over the meter and when the man came to read the meter, he yanked down the part that was over the meter. Now I train my Jackmanii to grow along the side of the meter, but not over it. From the front walk, you still can't see the meter itself, which is what I wanted to accomplish.
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I also have a Mrs. Cholmondely growing up the side of our deck railing. I planned to add some wire fencing around a couple of the pickets to help it climb this spot, but just haven't gotten around to it yet.

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Matt...can you tell me more about the vinyl siding hooks? What are they called and where do you get them? They sound perfecr for my! Thanks, Donna

matt, that is a beautiful jackmanii you have!
I like your idea of hanging wire lattice on hooks attached to the wall, so you can remove it in the winter, I will definitely use that in my garden. I never liked how my (bare) wire trellises look in the winter. Thanks for sharing!

Buyorsell, I also like your copper tubing. How thick is it and is it solid? Did you bend it yourself, by hand, or how did you make it spiral? How/where is it attached? Did you just stick it into the ground and is that enough support to hold the whole tube plus plant in place?
I have a viticella species that I would like to train to climb a crabapple(?) (malus rescue) tree, but it is quite difficult, well impossible, to make it climb the trunk and I don't think attaching anything (like hooks) to the trunk is such a good idea. I would like to copy your idea.

In 2007 I bought four potted clematis locally and planted them all on the same tower.

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Picture from this spring.

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Afew days later from another angle.

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Here is another picture of another of the same wire tower that they are on. I liked clematis blooming on the tower so much this spring I went out and bought four more potted ones locally. Going to do another clem tower.

Rita, I love your tower!

They climb wire like that easily at least they do for me.

The copper tubing is from Home Depot, it is what you use for plumbing. DH bent it himself by hand. I think it does come in a coil though when you buy it. It is just stuck into the ground about a foot. It is just hooked over a branch at the top in the tree. I have two of them, both had different Clematis growing up them previously that I shovel pruned. They have been fine through wind storms etc. You can see it on the purple leaf plum in this picture. Huldine is growing on it but I just planted her so she has been whacked back.

Here is Alionushka in an obelisk/cage. She was growing over the Hebe 'Red Edge' but she is so big this year (3rd) that she was smothering it and looking awful flopped all over.

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