New hedge

Why don't you go to your local nursery for ideas? I wouldn't want to have a hedge that potentially would get large and block the sun.

What is it about the rose hedge that you like? The height, the thorns (to keep out dogs etc), the flowers? You may have suggestions of other similar plants.

Burberry is thorny, smaller and deciduous although it has no flowers. I have a small hedge of miniature lilacs (miss kim) and I really like it. Minimal trimming, beautiful scented flowers in spring, and tidy dense shrub to keep out pets.

You CAN plant roses where others have grown, providing you plant them with myccorhizal fungi in contact with the roots. This is readily available in garden centres and from rose growers. Rosa rugosa is the traditional rose hedge. It is thorny and has attractive hips following flowering.

Beech hedges retain their dead leaves over winter and drop them in spring so you should be prepared for some clearing up in spring.

Personally, I'd choose roses over beech. Improve the soil with organic matter, plenty of fertiliser and the all important fungus.

I have also planted new roses in the same spot as previous roses and been very successful using the fungus.

We also have quite a long beech hedge in our front garden which is looking stunning at the moment in its Autumn colours.

We planted it 23 years ago and it took a few years to establish to be the dense barrier we now have. It needs trimming twice a year which is becoming quite a task as we get older even though we keep it no more than 5 ft high.

If you only have a short run I would go with SpringyChicken and plant Rosa Rugosa.

Beech would be a fair amount of work if you only want it under 6 foot. How about hypericum or common name st johns wort? Evergreen and flowers for a long time, can be cut back easily.

Or Griselinia littoralis, an attractive glossy evergreen, and there is a variegated variety.

I love photinia, red robin, for its changing colour, you can get a little red robin, grows to 1m.

We have a l-o-n-g beech hedge which requires brutal cutting once a year. Yes, beech doesn’t shed leaves until new leaf buds push through in the Spring, but I see that as an advantage. We’re on sandy soil: on clay soils hornbeam is a better bet.

I have Hornbeam which makes a more dense hedge than Beech, either way you will have to trim twice a year to keep it short.
Berberris is pretty tough and slow growing but I can’t say it is attractive

Even a native hedge such as willow, hazel, blackthorn, wild roses, hawthorne etc. They would also need trimming but a great encouragement for native species.

I'd have something evergreen to reduce the leaf clearing. A row of hebes make a nice little hedge about three feet high.

Why would you want something taller? Tall hedges just give burglars a good place to keep out of view.