What are your favourite trees (to plant in a back garden)?

[Pannacotta]

We need to plant a few in our back garden which is medium/large size for town - approx 20m long.
The trees will hopefully give us some screening from a tall block of flats, so will need to grow to 4m plus and provide decent cover, evergreen would be good but am not keen on any conifers or Eucalyptus.
Am thinking maybe Rowan, Chinese birch, possibly Whitebeam and Magnolia.
Any other suggestions?
Thanks

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A friend of mine has planted one of those curly hazels which has grown to about 3m in 5 years. She says it will grow a bit more but not enormous. I was quite fancying on myself.

one myself. I'm not planning to wear it.

Not sure I know what a curly hazel looks like, will google, thanks for the tip.
And no, am def not planning on planting an oak tree Orinoco, not sure what your council was thinking...

Magnolias are gorgeous but the one I bought my Mum is taking absolutely forever to grow!

I have a Japanese acer which is gorgeous and seems fast growing.

Orinoco - is it too late to remove the oak and replace it with something smaller? The council did exactly the same thing to my parents 30 years ago, only their garden was 15 feet. They rang up and asked the council to move it, but they refused, saying that it was their policy to provide greenery or some such nonsense. So my folks dug it up, replaced it with a much smaller rowan tree, and gave the oak to a friend of theirs who had a farm. And both trees are still going strong.

If I had my choice of trees I'd want something that bore fruit - perhaps pear or plum.

Magnolias are gorgeous but only when in flower - for the rest of the year they are quite dull. And they flower in April/May when it's often too cold to sit in the garden, so make sure you plant them in your front garden where you will actually see them, not the back where it might get forgotten.

My favourite small tree is Amelanchier - doesn't grow too big, stunning at all times of year: white blossom in spring, green leaves in summer and bright red all through the autumn.

yes agree that Amelanchiers are lovely, we had two in our previous garden, and I will get one for here but they are not great in terms of giving privacy/screening, as they're a bit too small.
There is a Magnolia which flowers now, think its the Grandiflora, which I have my eye on but I think from looking they are £££££.

Rowan, Amelanchier and Hibiscus are lovely.

Viburnum tinnus is evergreen and has pretty pink and white flowers.

The I have planted 5 yrs ago would be well over 2m high (I am keeping it pruned to this height). I saw one about 6m high in grounds of an abbey recently.

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I have a lovely acer in my back yard - it's about 3m I think. (pic on profile, taken in April). It is beautiful for 3 seasons too

I LOVE magnolia trees

you don't want anything taht will "self seed" though like sycamore

Japanese maples - some grow quite big. The house next door to ours in London had a beautiful holly that went as high as the second floor - probably take a century to get that big though.

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Magnolia grandiflora gorgeous and evergreen but can be a bit frost tender I think - if you go for it make sure you get one of the hardier ones.

acers are great, some grow quite big, beautfiul trees but lots of leaves to clear up.

Kilmarnock (pussy) willow- lovely.

Fast growing and screening - I have a massive berberis which is about 15' high now - of course, if you have small children, not ideal because of spikes.
Lilac makes a good screen, grows to about 12-15' tall I think, quite fast.
jasmine grows like a wotsit and can be trained over a screen, ditto honeysuckle

Our new garden has a magnolia tree which is currently in flower and is one of the garden highlights. It is a beautiful shape. We also have a lovely apple tree that dd has fallen in love with. The dog thinks it is an edible call tree. In my previous garden we had a blossom that did a good job of providing privacy at the back with what i think was a silver birch.