How to hide a compost bin?

Small garden: a screen for a climbing plant

In a small garden, you often have a 150 L or 300 L compost bin, fitted with a lid. Very handy for retrieving ripe compost from the base via the access hatch, it does, however, need a little space around it to bring garden waste and collect the compost.

Installing a screen or slatted panel on which you can grow a climbing plant is then a very practical way to hide your compost bin. Fit this “screen” against the side that does not require access (the compost bin side), leaving access at the side for passage.

At little cost, you can make your own screen using attractive reclaimed branches or by making a slatted panel from wooden boards. You can also invest in a wooden lattice trellis, perfect for training the climbing plant, or one or two hazel panels for a natural-yet-contemporary effect. A metal screen is also possible, provided the structure is sturdy enough to support a climbing plant, ideally evergreen, vigorous, performing well in partial shade (preferred exposure of the compost bin)… without being too invasive : fragrant honeysuckle (Lonicera Henryi or Lonicera japonica ‘Mint Crisp’), Trachelospermum, Clematis armandii, hops, Aristolochia, etc. With a very attractive or modern openwork screen, you can even make do with a deciduous plant that will simply adorn the area in the warmer months (Ipomoea, clematis or deciduous honeysuckle).

The advantage : an immediate, very attractive result for small gardens.

Screen and honeysuckle… job done !

Medium garden: privacy hedge

In a slightly larger space, you can afford to install a screening hedge that will serve as visual screen to hide your compost heap or compost bin. Compost bin being generally about 1 m high, you have a very wide choice within the range of hedge bushes to conceal it, which you should choose entirely evergreen. Leave sufficient space between compost bin and development of hedge, about 1 to 2 m margin.

Admittedly, you will need patience to wait 2 to 3 years for hedge to thicken and take its place to form expected screen, and will need to take out your shear from time to time on certain species, but you obtain a very ornamental result when you place your bushes in a curved shape or in an inverted “S” shape, and choose attractive, variegated foliage, even flowering bushes.

Among bushes of interest for this type of hedge, which must be compact and fast-growing: Variegated evergreen euonymus (spindle) and Berberis evergreen, Abelias, Lonicera nitida… In a very large garden, this can be a fine hornbeam hedge.

Bonus: camouflage blending into garden, effective and very natural.

Abelia grandiflora and Lonicera nitida ‘Baggesens Gold’ (photos: Leonora Enking)

For every garden: behind a shed, a large shrub or a graphic triptych

If you plan a garden shed in your layout, or already have one available, the simplest option is of course to place your compost bin just behind it. Your garden shed or greenhouse will act as a screen so you won’t need to resort to any other tricks!

Alternatively, a more plant-based option is to plant in front of a large, dense evergreen bush that grows well in shade or partial shade (Choisya, Euonymus with a broad habit, Escallonia ‘Apple Blossom’ with rapid growth, a handsome Osmanthus will also work well (such as Osmanthus ‘Gulftide’)).

You can also exploit the graphic silhouette of certain trees or bushes by grouping them in threes, creating visual features that make the ugly bin fade into the background: three euonymus with a fastigiate habit such as the superb ‘Benkomasaki’ or ‘White Spire’ (avoid conifers because of their generally slow growth). You can also choose another type of bush and prune it into a graphic shape to draw the eye to the bush rather than to what it hides… it works! For example, a Pyracantha trained as an espalier fruit tree, which will be covered in flowers in spring and red or orange berries in winter.

Bonus: highly ornamental living screens.

Escallonia ‘Apple Blossom’ and upright Euonymus ‘Benkomasaki’

Create a decorative, creative space!

In gardens with a little space (and materials), you will generally have a larger compost bin, or even several at different stages of ripening. You can then venture to create a compost corner that will blend naturally into its surroundings. To blend it into the landscape as well as possible, try to play on a verdant, wooded look by using garden materials as much as possible, so you can recycle them at the same time :

• bamboo canes that you will plant in the soil side by side at different heights for a striking effect, or as a wild little gate, or combined with heather brushwood or U-shaped reed screens around the compost bin

• pleaching of willow or hazel branches to create a hedge as beautiful as it is creative
• creating a garden shed incorporating your compost at one side (it must never be covered by a canopy),
• old gates as found (rusty!), or metal structures offering enough cover, which you will place in front of your bin: this will create a very original spot in the garden that you can accompany with small bushes

• Create a willow or wicker structure to draw attention away!
• Repurposed brushwood fencing in a seaside garden
• Small build combining stones or bricks and wood… Let your creativity speak!

Bonus: it’s your own creation, and a unique spot!