Picket Fences

You think a picket fence is a picket fence, right? It's ... a picket fence. But no. It's not as simple as that. In fact, it's a rage inducing succession of never-ending decisions. Shall we?

The quintessential picket fence. It looks so innocent. Yet, behind every picket there is a dark side.

A side with math.

To Picket or Not to Picket

When this project first started (in my brain) I didn't want a picket fence again. They're too popular, will eventually rot, and are cuter than I am. If given the choice between something cute or something creepy, I almost always choose creepy.

Enter the wrought iron fence phase which lasted about half an hour.

Even though I really like a black wrought iron fence, I didn't think it would "frame" the yard like a wood fence would. It would disappear into the shrubs and flowers during summer.

Which brought me right back to cute.

Picket Fence Choices

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Picket Style

Oh boy.

They're not just narrow flat boards with pointed tops. Pickets can be flat or square with pointed tops.

Square Pickets

Square pickets are a bit more formal. That's just my observation. I could be the only person in the world that thinks that.

These pickets are usually made out of 2x2's which actually measure 1.5" x 1.5"

Choosing square pickets means you don't have to decide on a picket size. It's going to be made with 2x2s.

Just to prove myself wrong, here is a square picket fence that looks informal because of the frothy plantings everywhere and the fact that it's been left unfinished.

Flat Pickets

Flat pickets can be anywhere from 1.5" wide to 4" wide. Which means now you're confronted with making a decision - which width of picket?

Fence Style

Once a picket style and width is chosen, now you're going to have to decide the overall style of the panels.

A classic, humble, picket fence would look something like this. Pickets all the same height and something most home owners could have built themselves.

A much fancier one would look like these.

A plain, simple fence can add some calm to the slightly manic plantings of an English cottage garden. I like the more elaborate picket fences when they're with a simple backdrop, like this clipped hedge.

I will not be doing a simple hedge, so the fancy fence option was eliminated from my brain along with any cast members beyond the first season of Survivor.

So now, about 16 months after beginning to think about it, I had committed to a simple flat picket fence of undetermined height and style.

Decisions to come ... include:

• Picket tops - Round, flat, pointy, very pointy, or arrow shaped
• Picket width - 1.5"? 3"? 4"?
• Picket spacing - Size of the picket? Wider than the picket? Half the size of the picket?
• Picket height - all the same height? Random heights? High/low?
• Cap rail or no cap rail?

I spent the first 16 months deciding on the basic fence. That left me exactly a day and a half to make every other fence decision after the contractor announced the carpenters would be starting in two days.

Cap or no Cap

You probably think that pickets have to be pointed but they don't. The pickets are just the vertical pieces of wood with space between each. It doesn't have to be pointy at the top to be a picket.

And if you choose a capped picket fence (where a long top rail runs horizontally with the fence panel), it can't be pointy topped, it has to be straight cut so the top rail can sit on top.

Exposed posts or hidden?

In the two photos above, the posts are exposed. The panels of fence run between them, not over top of them.

I like an exposed post, especially if the picket fence is long. Exposed posts break up the monotony of pickets a bit if it's a long run.

It was right about this time I started wondering about living in a condo again. Condo Karen never had to think about any of this.

Picket Width & Spacing

A space equal to the width of the picket is pretty standard. For more privacy or screening you could cut that in half and have smaller spaces between the boards.

The smaller the spaces between pickets, the more the fence will cost because you're using more wood for every panel.

This was enough to make my head explode.

And I ended up deciding on what I initially said I didn't want. As is often the case.

Copying Historic Fences

This entire decision making process (which I could have paid the landscape architect more money to do) was excruciating for me.

Then I remembered something.

I couldn't describe it if you asked me, but I knew every time I saw the picket fence at Dundurn Castle, a local historic site, I thought to myself that it looked just like a picket fence should.

It's the fence that surrounds their parking lot and the pathway from it to the castle.

I could have spent another 18 hours on Pinterest looking at other people's fences. Instead, I drove to a national historic site with a tape measure.

So I got in my car and made a trip to Dundurn Castle to start measuring pickets and spaces.

2.5" pickets with 2.5" spaces. I figure they know what they're doing, being a historic garden and all so I took a few photos and sent them off to the contractor.

Picket Top

I at least knew that I would have a pointed top, but a decision about how pointed had to be made.

I mean honestly. There was no end to the decision making.

I went with a 40 degree picket. I have no idea what that means, but I think the Dundurn Castle pickets are 50 degrees.

Who cares anymore.

Yes. That is my official stance. I completely forgot to talk about posts. That's a whole OTHER thing.

Every decision feels permanent, irreversible and wildly consequential. Which is extreme for someone whose previous fence looked like this for about a decade too long.

Soon you'll see the reveal of my picket fence which is currently doing its job of surrounding my garden of dirt.t

I'll talk about the choices I made, where I made an unfixable mistake and how I'll prevent that kind of thing in the future.

I look forward to the future and the lack of decisions it will bring.