Have you ever walked through a landscape and seen a shrub shaped into a perfect sphere, a spiral, or even a green and leafy animal? That’s the magic of topiary — the art of shaping living plants into recognizable garden art.
I’ve had lions, tigers, orangutans, dolphins, falcons, snakes, Sesame Street characters, and even shrubby photographers inhabit in my garden — all topiary. During many years as a theme park horticulturist, my team and I designed and built towering topiary displays for our annual Food & Wine Festival, some reaching up to 18 feet tall. These living sculptures were popular favorites and captured the imagination of families and garden enthusiasts alike.
What Exactly Is Topiary?
Topiary is the art of training and trimming plants into specific shapes.
- A neatly clipped hedge is topiary.
- A shrub pruned into a tree form is also topiary.
- But the most iconic examples are those shaped into geometric, architectural, or animal figures.
In the hands of talented topiary artists, topiary transforms ordinary plants into extraordinary garden art.
A Brief History of Topiary
Topiary has deep roots in ancient garden traditions.
- The Egyptians, Chinese, Persians, and Greeks all practiced forms of ornamental plant shearing.
- In Rome, ornamental gardeners were called topiarii — which is Latin for “ornamental gardener.” As Michaelangelo freed his sculpture within from stone, the topiarist shapes live plants into art.
- Examples in ancient art: the female Egyptian Pharaoh Hatshepsut had topiary scenes carved into the walls of her mortuary temple at Deir el-Bahri. Topiary is also prominently represented in artworks from classical Greece to imperial China.
The discipline of topiary was preserved in medieval monastery gardens, where geometric and animal forms were carefully maintained, evolving into familiar features of formal European garden design.
Disney and the Modern Topiary Revolution
The popularity of modern topiary displays owe much to Walt Disney. In the early 1960s, Walt became impressed by European topiary while on vacation but was frustrated with how long it took to grow recognizable shapes.
Enter Bill Evans, a Southern California nurseryman and Disney’s landscape designer. Walt challenged him to bring beloved Disney characters to life in topiary form. The solution was revolutionary:
- Metal frames were welded into character outlines.
- Traditional topiary feature woody shrubs planted in the ground where the shrubs are trained and shaped into recognizable forms. This technique takes 3-10 years to grow into a finished presentation ready topiary.
- The innovation was to stuff these frames with moss and then to plant tiny herbaceous plant plugs directly into the moss covering the exterior skin of the stuffed frame.
This technique — called sphagnum topiary — provided for near instant displays, skipping the years-long wait for shrubs to grow in. Sphagnum topiary are still the primary topiaries seen at theme parks, botanical gardens and corporate campuses today.
Growing Topiary at Home
So, how can you bring this art into your own garden?
Traditional Topiary- Start with a fine-textured woody plant like rosemary, boxwood, or podocarpus planted at the base of the frame.
- Train and shear it over time into spheres, cones, spirals, or familiar shapes.
Moss or Sphagnum Topiary
- Custom fabricate or purchase a premade wire frame.
- Stuff the frame with moss and plant small herbaceous plants such as alternanthera or creeping fig directly into the moss stuffing.
- Think of topiary as pets-they require regular and consistent watering, feeding, grooming, and care. Neglect will show quickly!
Whether displayed in your garden beds, on patios, or as tabletop décor, topiary brings both artistry and a whimsical living element to your backyard retreat.
Final Thoughts
Topiary is specialized gardening — it’s living sculpture. From ancient temples to theme parks, and from backyard rosemary pots to towering festival displays, topiary combines artistry, creativity, and horticultural skill.
If you’re ready to try your hand at it, start small, experiment with shapes and plant varieties, and most importantly — enjoy the process. After all, a well-tended topiary is more than just a plant, it’s a piece of living art.
Text and images: by Joe Parr