This is the One Fragrant Plant You Need to Hide Backyard Bins, and Transform the Look of Your Yard in Minutes

Every backyard has a few practical functions to fulfil. If you’re a keen gardener, you’ll likely have bins for making your own nutrient-rich compost, or even a seed-growing and potting area. There’s a small problem here, and that is that these corners aren’t always the most aesthetically pleasing. So if you’re looking for a plant to hide an ugly bin, storage or compost area fast, we’ve got just the thing.

Late winter and early spring are the ideal times to put in new plants, so they can get their feet into the damp post-winter soil and romp away as the days begin to lengthen and the sun’s rays become stronger.

There are plenty of different ways to incorporate a compost bin into your yard, and just as many choices when it comes to screening them. In our opinion, one of the best, and most environmentally friendly ways, is by using plants as living screens. While landscaping with hedges is no doubt a beautiful option that will encourage biodiversity into your backyard, they can take time to mature. For me, A Clematis armandii is the only plant for the job, and below I explain why.

The Best Spring-Flowering Climber for Fast Growth

Named after a 19th century French cleric who collected plants in China, armand clematis (or Clematis armandii) is an easy-going evergreen climber that will eventually reach around 30 feet in height and 15 feet in spread.

It can put on up to 10 feet of growth each year, so if you’re installing trellis privacy ideas in front of your compost bins, it makes a great choice to quickly cover that unsightly corner of the yard.

In early spring, beginning in March in some areas and continuing into April, armand clematis is smothered in single, open star-shaped flowers. These are held in dense clusters, the slim white petals surrounding a centre of cream-colored stamens. Their fresh, almond-like scent on a sunny, early-spring day is truly fabulous: a spring delight caught on a warm breeze.

For particularly strong, sweet-smelling flowers, try the cultivar ‘Apple Blossom’. It’s just as easy to grow, but this one has pale pink rather than white flowers. Or grow Clematis armandii 'Snowdrift' for its extra-large white flowers and more compact leaf shape. And you can find Clematis armandii ‘Snowdrift’ at The Sill.

Ideal for US hardiness zones 6-9, the leaves of armand clematis are long fingers of deep bottle green, with a lovely shine to the surface. It's one of the best evergreen climbers, so the leaves stay on the plant all year round, providing an attractive verdant screen or, if you like, a wonderful foil to more perennial planting in front. An added bonus is that the new shoots of the plant emerge a pretty pinkish red colour.

How to Plant Armand Clematis to Hide Backyard Bins

Like all fast-growing climbing plants, armand clematis need a support to clamber up. Unlike some vines, armand clematis is self clinging, so it won’t cause any damage as its tendrils gently twist, curl and wrap themselves around a support system such as wires or trellis.

For hiding backyard bins, we recommend using sturdy panels for support and screening such as this raised bed with trellis from Target or this white fence trellis from Lowes.

Once your screen is in place, plant armand clematis (ideally in March) by digging a large hole with the rootball around 3 inches below the level it was in its pot.

Make sure it’s at least 12 inches from a wall or any of the trellis posts. If the roots of the plant are at all pot-bound, tease them out gently with your fingers before planting, backfilling with soil and then watering it in well.

Armand clematis thrives in a full sun or part shade, so ideally plant it in a south or west-facing spot. It will look a little more sparse in a spot with more shade, and flower a touch later, but its leaves will be a darker shade of green and have more shine to them.

In terms of soil, Clematis armandii isn’t fussy. It’s fine on acid soil, but particularly happy on chalky. It’s at home in clay, or light, sandy soil or anything in between. One things it’s not keen on are cold, drying winds, however, so a little shelter is best.

How to Train Clematis Armandii

Armand clematis is a vigorous vine, and it will send up plenty of strong vertical shoots throughout spring and summer, naturally reaching up towards the light.

For the best, most dense screening and to cover every part of your trellis, do your best to train these new shoots sideways along the trellis, tying them in loosely with soft garden twine, like this one from Amazon.

This will give you more coverage, as well as encourage flowers lower down on the plant, rather than a proliferation of foliage and blooms at the top.

How to Prune Armand Clematis

Clematis armandii is a vigorous vine, which is why we love it for quickly screening eyesores in the backyard. But thankfully it’s easy to keep under control.

It’s a plant that flowers on old wood (the previous season’s growth), so if it needs taming – and don’t feel obliged to prune armand clematis if it doesn’t need keeping in check – all you really need to do is to give it a good haircut after it’s finished flowering, in mid to late spring.

Simply grab a sharp pair of secateurs like these Fiskars bypass pruners from Ace Hardware and cut back overlong shoots to healthy buds. Do beware of pruning too late in the summer or you risk removing next year’s flower buds.

Once your Clematis armandii has settled in, early spring is a good time to remove any growth that’s dead, diseased or wind damaged, ready for the new growing season.

At the same time, apply a balanced slow-release fertilizer (you can make your own fertilizer if you feel creative) and mulch with 2-3 inches of organic matter, such as garden compost or brown mulch from Lowes, around the base of the plant.

This will benefit your plant in three ways, retaining moisture in the soil, helping to suppress weeds and generally keep your clematis strong, healthy and disease free.

Planting Combinations for Clematis Armandii

For even more flower power to cover those backyard bins, try combining armand clematis with a favourite rose in a pale colour, which will pop beautifully against the backdrop of those dark clematis leaves, as well as cover any bare stems at the base of the plant.

Some of the most reliable and best roses include subtly scented ‘Iceberg’, with its beautiful clusters of white flowers, each one with the faintest hint of pink at the base of the petal. Or opt for pale pink-apricot Moonlight in Paris, a Floribunda rose with a sweet yet spicy perfume.

You can find Iceberg roses at Nature Hill.

If you’re looking to hide backyard bins with beauty and ease, you really can’t go wrong with an evergreen clematis like Clematis armandii. With its rich, heady perfume and abundance of white flowers so early in the gardening season, it’s a joy to care for.

What’s more, it’ll soon cover any sturdy structure you put in, asking little more than a quick tidy-up once a year to perform at its best.

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