Physocarpus opulifolius. One of the purple forms, sheared into an unnatural hedge-like habit.

Much handsomer (and much larger) when allowed to assume its natural shape.

Much of my garden seems to have been cut like this. I've got some work ahead of me figuring out what stays, what goes, what gets hard pruned

T N C, when all else fails, a perfectly good option for all multi-stemmed shrubs is to coppice them or in other words, cut them right to the ground. Numerous new stems will emerge and you will in effect have "new" shrubs. We do this all the time-it's not experimental. Just be sure the shrub in question is really a multi-stemmed shrub and not one which exits the ground as a single stem.

Nevertheless, it is full and has good color. You've got something to work with. Mine may look like a fountain but it is thin, even though its been in the ground 3 seasons.

All you have to do with this specimen is discontinue the shearing and it will recover a natural shape on its own.

I like to prune some of mine into small, multi-trunked trees. The bark is amazing (hence the common name) and once the basic shape is formed, which takes a few years, there is minimal pruning each year - pulling off a few suckers which come off easily and doing a bit of tip-pruning on the crown.