Common Box Hedging

Buxus Sempervirens Hedging

Common Box, Buxus sempervirens, is a native evergreen hedging plant that is great for low, ornamental borders and topiary. It has dense, fragrant little leaves that clip beautifully and tolerate full shade. It is slow growing, so makes a low maintenance hedge. Our box plants are grown outdoors and they are clipped for extra bushiness.
Grown freely, a boxwood tree will reach about 8 metres tall but it will take a very long time doing it...
You can also buy Dwarf Box bushes here, which are better for low hedges and edging under 50cms tall. Alternatively, view our selection of evergreen hedging or see our full range of hedging plants.

Box hedge plants are delivered bareroot during winter (Nov-March) and pot-grown year round. Bareroot Box bushes are cheaper than pot grown plants. Pot grown Box is available in the largest sizes.

Choosing a size: When you are ordering Box plants for a hedge, we generally recommend that you use small plants. They are cheaper than large plants, easier to handle and they will establish well in poor conditions. Use larger plants if you want a taller hedge quickly, if you want instant impact or if you want to clip them as topiary plants. All our hedge plants are measured by their height in centimetres above the ground (the roots aren't measured).

Spacing a Box hedge:
Plant bareroot Box hedging at 5 plants per metre, 20cms apart in a single row.
You can plant the larger pot-grown Box plants at 4 per metre, 25cms apart.

General description of Box plants:
Boxwood is found growing wild in the South of Britain. It is a shaggy, mop-headed small tree or large shrub, often with lush side shoots growing all over its trunk. Because it is quite slow growing, box is most often used for short, decorative hedging, but given enough time a box hedge can become a grand sight, over 6 metres high with thick, springy growth down to ground level.
Box has tiny yellow-green flowers, hidden at the base of the leaves, which attract bees.
Box is an excellent plant for shady places and it will tolerate poor, dry and compacted soils.
Deer and rabbits do not eat box.

History & uses of Buxus sempervirens
Boxwood timber is prized for inlay work, being very hard and close grained with a warm yellow tone that polishes well. Boxwood is also used to make the best mallet heads, both for the carpentry shop and the croquet lawn. Most of us can remember the old yellow boxwood school rulers, sometimes with a list of kings and queens on the back. The best boxwood is used as an ivory substitute.

Box trees are considered a sacred plant in Georgia, where Box twigs are taken to church on Palm Sunday to bring protection to the home and good luck to the family. Boxwood oil was used in the past to try and cure epilepsy and leprosy, sadly without success, and for some time it was used to try to lower the fever caused by malaria when quinine was unavailable. Although it is has been discovered that all parts of the plant are poisonous to humans if eaten, homeopaths believe that it is a treatment for rheumatism.
Box hedging is traditionally clipped on Derby Day in early June, although we think that it is much better to clip them in mid-winter. Good exercise on Boxing Day as long as it is not freezing.