Trellis

Discussion

Trellis is a term used to describe a network of vertical, horizontal, and diagonal posts and rails designed to support vegetation. The term “treillage” was also used to refer to trellis work, especially in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century treatises; in the early nineteenth century the term “treliage” was noted on Charles Varlé’s plan of Bath (Berkeley Springs), Va. (later W.Va.). Trellis was also closely associated with espalier,especially by the mid-nineteenth century when the latter term referred to the support material (including trellis or lattice work) upon which fruit trees and ornamental trees were trained (see Espalier). Trellises also fulfilled a decorative function in the garden. In Batty Langley’s New Principles of Gardening (1728), the trellis was recommended as a framing device to direct a view to a distant focal point [Fig. 1]. Trellises could take on elaborate forms and were used for garden structures such as arbors and summerhouses (see Arbor and Summerhouse). A.-J. Dézallier d’Argenville’s The Theory and Practice of Gardening (1712) indicates that such structures decreased in popularity in the early eighteenth century because they were relatively expensive for impermanent wooden structures. While Dézallier d’Argenville recommended treillage for decorative structures found in the pleasure ground, Thomas Jefferson (1804) insisted that “treillages” belonged in the kitchen garden, which suggests that he used them primarily for training fruit trees.

Seventeenth-, eighteenth-, and early nineteenth-century gardening treatises all generally describe the feature as supports for fruits trained against walls; therefore, trellises were located frequently in the walled kitchen garden. Placing fruit trees or fruit-bearing vegetation on trellises attached to walls was beneficial; the wall sheltered the fruit and radiated warmth that hastened its ripening. Moreover, affixing and spreading a tree or vine against a trellis often stimulated fruit production. For similar reasons, the trellis was used in hothouses and greenhouses, especially in the nineteenth century when specialized forcing houses became increasingly popular. In 1826, J.C. Loudon set forth seven types of trellises for hothouses and greenhouses, each differentiated by its location within these structures.