Oh I so feel your pain as our neighbours ugly deck and random plastic sheeting is against our fence. We planted a magnolia that will one day be of use but this summer I’m hoping to add some kind of additional height to the fence too because I hate it.

Can you fence behind the shrubs?

Gee, I think the house isn’t the worst eyesore. The natural wood siding is less obtrusive than if it were painted. The best distraction is going to be a tree. Magnolias are dense, full and fast growing. Spring for a big one. And then reorient your view by placing lawn furniture facing your house, not theirs.

I agree about the natural wood. Imagine if it were a glaring white. White bloomed trees like magnolia would look good against the current colour.

@KW PNW Z8 I was kind of thinking the same thing so I might go for the high trellis while the arborvitae are growing. Thank you!

@kitasei2 that is actually true, it just looks so unfinished. Magnolias are beautiful, but I just don’t want to wait for another tree to grow. Thanks for the idea!

I love the high trellis idea! I'm going to steal that for my own yard. Also, this might be an opportunity for some neighborly collaboration (if that seems like an option - neighbors can be hit or miss, of course). Perhaps, you could chat with this neighbor about the observation that it was probably difficult to get to that side of the house to paint before you came in and did clean up and maybe the two of you could work together to get that side of the house painted :)

Bamboo grows superfast. My parents used it to block a school that went up beside their house. Worked great. It does tend to take over the space quickly tho.

Bamboo can work great in many climates but make sure you select a clumping variety that is not set on world domination like the running types are.

Personally, I think the freestanding tall trellising is an excellent idea!

While waiting for things to grow in, tell everyone that that is in fact your barn.

If you want to cover it quickly plant a very large tree. That will cost a lot of money (many thousands), but will provide immediate coverage.

You need to put in something fairly involved back there like the above garden with trellis backdrop anyway because you have got that imposing set of stairs beckoning visitors to that part of your property. And implying that there is something significant back there to look at.

The way it is now the stairs direct attention to the general area and the exclamation marks hedge (you have them too far apart to provide coverage anytime soon) says "Yoo hoo! Over here! Over here! Look at this house next door!".

I’m happy that my suggestion of an aerial trellis has been so well received! I’ll add a bit of detail for @rachel12reed & anyone else who may try to replicate a version of it. We have another one of these along a side fence in our back yard - it is only two sections & no center feature in it. It has low plants in front of it with curved iron structures filling in under it instead of shrubs. The decorative iron can be easily seen when this tree is not in leaf. The bigger 3 section one has a leaded glass window in center which is lit at night. These weren’t DIY - the folks who installed our pavers & water feature built them. They are very beefy & heavy duty - 10’ timbers sunk in cement & wood wrapped. The bigger one has shrubs filling in the two side sections now which hide the fence. Here’s the smaller one - you can see that it serves the purpose of screening from our neighbors who have a yard that is higher than ours. you can see the fence sloping on right side of tree. This fence is also 6’ tall. The neighbors were thrilled when we had this built. Their house is higher than their yard & several levels of patio. This was a win win for us & them.

I just noticed your own structure to the right back there. Could you move it - and raise it? - to the center where it would become the focal point needed as Embo notes, and hide the house?