The waning interest in espalier fruit growing in the 20. Jh. probably also had its reason in the fact that the trellis forms, according to the fashion, were more and more playful and connected with a too high maintenance effort. The literature named and drew for instance a snake trellis with 3 circles on top of each other, circular palmette in 3 tiers, composite hoop trellis with straight and circular axes, spiral trellis with 4 string trees etc., all tree forms that required almost daily supervision. This was simply too much.
After the 1. and 2. After World War II, rational production of fruits and vegetables was initially more important for survival, and there was neither time nor inclination for "gimmicks" with shaped fruits.
Thanks to the participation of old and newly founded garden clubs in the 1970s and their professional consultations, fresh interest was aroused again, in which the newly organized allotment garden system also played a considerable role. Now the gardens were significantly smaller than before and people returned to the space-saving forms of cultivation with high-quality fruit. Weak-growing rootstocks and new, more robust cultivars without alternance (alternating high and low yields each year) made the simple trellis forms interesting again, even though they required comparatively more maintenance than conventional round crowns.
Today, only those forms are advocated which are easy to grow and which do not impose too great a constraint on natural growth. The playful trellis forms of the 19. The trees of the twentieth century certainly look decorative in the patterns, but in practice they require almost daily attention and also considerable knowledge and skills for correct upbringing. If interest in it wanes for even a year, such intricate forms very soon go wild and are then almost impossible to undo.
Trellis forms
Were first planted along the walls of palace parks, but later they also found their way into the gardens of the common people.