Yes, without exception — and the reasons are more practical than aesthetic. A boundary project done in the wrong order costs more, takes longer and usually leaves something that cannot be fixed afterwards.
The right order
| Stage | Why it belongs here |
|---|---|
| 1. Cut or reduce the hedge | Heaviest, messiest work; needs clear space to work in |
| 2. Remove any trees in the line | Same reason, and access is best now |
| 3. Grind stumps | Ground is open and the machine can reach |
| 4. Clear the base | Roots, rubble and old post stumps come to light |
| 5. Set out and install the fence | On a clear, established line |
| 6. Replant or turf | Last, so nothing walks over it |
The practical reasons
- Room to work. Cutting a hedge with a new fence eighteen inches behind it is slow, awkward and risks the fence.
- Somewhere for the cuttings to fall. Obvious until it is not. A new fence panel is a poor landing site for hedge arisings.
- Stumps and roots. Fence posts want to go exactly where old stumps and root plates already are. Finding that out after the fence is set out means moving the line or losing a post position.
- Access. Machinery gets to a boundary far more easily before there is a fence along it.
- The line itself. Until the hedge is cut back you often cannot see where the actual boundary runs.
Are you keeping the hedge or replacing it?
Worth deciding properly, because the answer changes the whole job.
Keeping it, fence in front or behind: the hedge wants cutting back hard on the fence side first, so there is room to build and so it is not immediately growing into the new fence. Leave a working gap — closer than about 300mm and you will never be able to cut that face again.
Replacing it: hedge and stumps out first, then the fence. And it is worth checking the height question before committing, because a fence will not necessarily replace what the hedge was doing.
The fence height point
Under permitted development a boundary fence is generally limited to two metres, and one metre where it fronts a highway. If the hedge coming out is three or four metres of screening, a fence will not replace it — which is an argument for reducing the hedge rather than removing it, or for a fence with planting in front.
Trees in the hedge line — check before you commit
This matters particularly on older boundaries around Chipping Campden. A hedge cannot carry a Tree Preservation Order, but a tree grown up within one can, and an old hedge that has become a line of trees can be covered too.
Chipping Campden's historic centre is a conservation area, so a tree in the hedge line there needs six weeks' written notice to Cotswold District Council before it comes out — unless its stem is under 75mm across, measured 1.5m above the ground. A tree with a TPO needs written consent at any size, with no equivalent exemption.
Discovering that after the fencing is booked is the expensive version. It is one phone call at planning stage.
Doing it as one job
Where the same company handles the hedge work, the tree work and the fencing, the saving is not just the access and the waste run happening once. It is that decisions on the day get made with the whole project in view — how far the hedge face comes back, whether a stump is worth grinding, where the material is stacked so it is not in the way of the posts.
Split across two contractors, those decisions tend to fall in the gap between them.
Planning a new boundary?
Tell us what's there now and what's going in. We handle hedge work, tree work and fencing, so it can be planned as one job.
More Chipping Campden Hedge Maintenance Guides
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