New raised bed in my garden

[mark smyth]

5 feet in 10 years - I'll be 62 if I live that long - so I'll maybe go for a Kojo. Lots in garden centres just now

[Diane Clement]

My memory had deceived me.  The Prunus was bought in 2006, so it's now only 7 years old.  I have trimmed it back the last couple of years to keep it at 5ft.  Interestingly, the equivalent postition on the other side of our garden has a Hamamelis which is lower than the Prunus, and it a slightly older plant.  I do cut the hamamelis back each year after flowering, but it's less than 5ft now.
But it's not just about ultimate height, they are a very different shape, the hamamelis is a small tree, whereas the prunus has more of a shrubby feel.  Here's the Hamamelis in its full glory

[Lvandelft]

Prunus Kojo-no-mai can be pruned hard after flowering. In a friends garden it gets never higher than 1 meter after more than 10 years. I have acuired one as shrub which I like most. Another one is grown on a stem which makes a nice rounded flowering mound, but after flowering I don't like these artificial forms much and will probably put it in some corner where it's not so in sight 

[mark smyth]

I didn't know Hamamelis can be hard pruned

[Tony Willis]

Prunus Kojo-no-mai can get quite big when in the open ground.  The Ashwood ones and John Gennard's are, I think, in pots which keep them small for display.  Here's mine, now over 5ft tall perhaps 8 or 10 years old.

Mine got to 12 feet until it succumbed to winter wet last year. They look lovely in a small pot because they flower at only a foot high but are vigorous when liberated

[David Nicholson]

Here's my Prunus Kojo-no-mai (I first posted this in March 2011). We grow this in a pot and have had it for nearly 13 years having bought it as it flowers in March and is usually in full flower to commemorate the anniversary of my Mum's death.

[Diane Clement]

I didn't know Hamamelis can be hard pruned 

I don't hard prune it, I take a bit (perhaps 6-8") off each main branch just to keep it tidy and not too tall.  It's never done it any harm, it always performs well in January.

[Brian Ellis]

I didn't know Hamamelis can be hard pruned

I take a third of the new growth off after it has flowered and it doesn't seem to harm it at all. Pruning should be done after flowering but before summer so that flower buds for the following year have time to form.

[Lesley Cox]

Mark I agree with Maggi. Don't do it. Having been lifting plants from a raised bed in recent weeks, I can tell you the roots of even a very small tree are very greedy and rob the other plants, get hopelessly tangled so that moving smaller things becomes very difficult or impossible without major damage to the smaller things, the roots cover and obliterate clumps of smaller bulbs like crocus, Iris reticulata and the like and IT WILL GROW TOO BIG - as everyone seems to agree. If you absolutely must, there are a few good suggestions above, or try a larger rock garden plant, something upright or even a VERY small conifer, grown on its own roots, (be quite sure that it is) but I still go with my original thought - don't! (There's a little Chinese elm called 'Frosty' which might be suitable but even that can put on height after a while.)