Try a bush. The heat/steam from the furnace may damage certain bushes but if it does, it's only $20 or so (and if it does, you could try a small artificial bush).

Could we see the whole front of the house?

the comments miss the point...why was the exhaust vent placed below a nice bay window?...and can it be relocated...understand these HVAC guys usually want to do what’s easiest for them without taking aesthetics into consideration for the homeowner...and there again, why didn’t the homeowner kick up a fuss?...

IMO

I added a photo of the whole front of the house. @callirhoe123

@tigerdunes Im not sure why the previous owner let it be placed there. As far as moving it, the only other place I think it could go ends up being right next to the “front door” which is actually on the side of the house. It would still look ugly there. But, maybe it would be better there because we could put a bench or something in front of it that wouldn’t look too weird. 🤷🏻‍♀️ For now though, it is where it is.

It is what it is, so let's hide it. Basically you just need to make a much deeper planting bed on this side of the house. With an 8' deep bed, in the bay window section at least, you can plant short dwarf evergreens, hollies are good, four feet out from the house and vent. That is far enough away for the plant to be fine, leave plenty access and clearance as needed and hide both the gas meter and vent from view.

This whole side of the house could use a nice low height foundation planting.

@Stax Yeah, kind of weird but the “front door” is on the side of the house. Although not the norm, not totally uncommon in this area for some reason.

"the comments miss the point...why was the exhaust vent placed below a nice bay window?...and can it be relocated..."

Well, yes, but $1000+ to relocate the system vs $20 to plant a bush.

I think Christopher has the right idea--it's a good spot for a hedge (or grouping of shrubs) anyway.

This looks like a very nice older home--they can be difficult when it comes to adding modern things. This may have been the best spot...

Agree with Christopher- a short hedge.

The gas meter feeding the home is less than 10 feet away, but this isn't circled in the picture?

Spray paint the apparatuses grey, they become invisible to you. LOL.

The gas meter was mentioned in the OPs post and obviously it can be hidden by plantings without the worry of killing them. Gray against beige will become in invisible? Lol. Christopher C Nc’s advice is perfect.

Given that your home has Tudor styling and is a neutral color, have you considered adding color via perennial shrubs and taller perennial flowers for your planting zone? You can expand a planting area (or slightly elevate one) as recommended by Christopher C Nc and make it a superb focal point while hiding the view of these pipes/gas meter.

We already plan to do some planting of hydrangeas and other small bushes. We also plan to add a window box under the window on the left. This post was more aimed at specifically how to hide the vent since it can kill plants. But thank you for your input.

What Christopher said. Plant SMALL hydrangeas there. Small meaning their mature height, not the height they are when you buy them.

Bobo hydrangea would be a good one to try.

@Austin Air Companie We already have a plan to cover the gas meter. I was trying to be specific in my question and focus more on what we were unsure about. But thank you for your sarcasm.

@littlebug zone 5 Missouri Yes, we always look at the mature height. But I know that is a common mistake so thank you for the input!

I hid my gas meter by painting it a light beige (red brick with beige mortar) and then plating holly bushes along the front. I also painted my furnace exhaust pipes the same color. However after the second year the furnace exhaust killed the top 1/3 of one holly. I think it just thawed it out during winter at that spot. If I can revive it or plant new I'll either add a slight angle to the exhaust or wrap the holly in burlap to protect it and see how that works.

We're facing this same challenge with a new high efficiency furnace vent coming out of our front bay window. @HU-514395560 - did you have luck with using plants to hide your vent? If so, what species worked? I'm hoping to plant a low evergreen a couple feet out from the vent to hide it year-round. We wanted a high efficiency furnace and unfortunately this was the only spot to vent it, but the sales guy sure did downplay how big the vent is and also led me to believe we could successfully landscape around it which I'm now second guessing.

Paint it the same color as the house - 90%. Then place some small bushes to distract the eye - 95%. Or larger bushes to cover completely - 100%.

@kgally We painted the vent to match our house and then we planted a hydrangea in front of it. The hydrangea hasn’t done well but it’s not necessarily because of the vent. We planted others elsewhere and they aren’t doing well either. I would say to go ahead and try the evergreen out and paint the vent.

Thank you for the information! Glad to hear that at least the vent didn't kill the hydrangea, and hopefully it will start to thrive next summer! Thanks again.