I am excited to see what others can offer as advice; your arbor has a lot of potential! Have you visited local public gardens to see how they use vines in similar presentations?

Joseph

Hi Joseph,

I've been a vine lurker for several years now. We have a fabulous NC Botanical Gardens and several other inspiring locations. I am a vine groupie of a couple restaurants that have spectacular display. That's where I fell in love with Lady Banks Rose.

Thanks for posting! :)

Erin

Good luck with Lady Banks Rose, it sounds like that is your dream plant. Post pictures of your flowers on the arbor!

Joseph

Erin, I'd love to see pictures of the arbor. Soon to be adding one, mine will be 14' x 28' x10'. How much shade do you get from the 2x2 spacing?

A simple support could be made by drilling stainless screws into the 6x's and crisscrossing a sturdy twine or copper wire.

Rosie

Hi Rosie,

You got it. I'll dig around for some photos. Hard drive crashed a few times but I'm pretty sure I have some on a removable device somewhere. If all else fails, I'll go out and take some more photos.

On another front... I have planted the Lady Banks rose at one post, two Clematis (pink and purple) on two other posts, and for an annual flare, bird house gourds and luffa. Let's hope all goes well with that. :)

Stay tuned... pics coming.

Cheers,
Erin

It provides dappled shade. It's perfect for hardening off plants. It is a bit cooler under the arbor. In fact, I'm surprised at how much.

Here's a pic of it before the final railing was placed. I think I was flat footed on the grass when I took it.

It's kind of hard to tell from this pic but it has a tray ceiling too. I did this by tapering the center 2x6s at the ends.

More pics please! Would love to figure out the tray ceiling effect. Are you going to install lighting/fans?

Good work on the plantings. Love the idea of gourds. If you have another post, consider dolichis lablab - Hyacinth vine. A gorgeous, showy vine. First saw many years ago at the U of GA's Trial Gardens.

You got it. More pics coming up. I just took about 10 for you. As soon as I find that bling-blang cable, I'll load them to photobucket. (Will have to resort to asking my husband where it is this evening.)

I don't think I'll put a light or a fan in it. There's a porch light already on the house and provides enough light at a distance should we need it. A downside to having a light right above the seating area is that it would be a beacon for biting insects. I would have to find a way to make the fan weather proof as the slats are not a good water barrier as is.

Thank you for the recommendation for Hyancinth vine. I will definitely look into it. I think there's plenty of room for other vines that can provide multi-season interest.

It seems I'm having trouble with photobucket now. Can I just email them to you? Let me know.

Cheers,
Erin

No, no.. you have to post them so we can all see them....!

How about this? Let me know if this link doesn't work.

Erin

Here is a link that might be useful: Arbor Photos

That link worked - very impressive structure!

Lady Banks rose is not hardy here so I can't speak from experience. But a 'virtual' gardening friend from California grows it and her tales of pruning it to keep it controlled are rather frightening! We had "New Dawn' climbing roses on an arbour here for almost 10 years. They were beautiful and disease-resistant, but VERY throny and VERY vigorous. The pruning just became too much work - and too - literally - bloody dangerous :-) We removed them last spring and replaced them with more clematis.

I think you'd be wise to choose vines that are not thorny and that can do without detailed pruning for a long time. I don't know all the options you have in your zone but here I'd stick to honeysuckle - one of the less vigorous ones - and clematis. Or just clematis, choosing a variety of compatable colors. The pruning 'rules' for clematis would tell you that some would need heavy annual pruning, which would be a problem on that structure. Happily though, I have been growing 'hard prune' types for many years with minimal pruning! In my experience, they bloom just as well - and even better in most cases! - if the only pruning is tidying up what is growing where you don't want it. So I grow all three clematis groups, applying a minimal, tidy up pruning regime to them all. A bonus from that is that I get a long bloom period since I mix early, mid and late season varieties in the same area. I don't know if my approach would work as well in your climate or not. Before I covered that structure with a thorny monster, I'd certainly be inclined to try more 'peaceful' plants first! (You'd need to do something like run copper wires through screw-eyes up the main posts to give clematis a route to climb to get to the top.)

You might find the tool in the atached link handy for pruning any vine growing on that structure. It is an invaluable tool for us, particularly for keeping the wisteria trees pruned and for pruning the vines on arbours.

Here is a link that might be useful: Long arm pruners

Wow, the arbor is indeed big and awesome, thanks for the "before" photo, Erin!