Be kind to hedges. They provide great privacy. The acid loving varieties here grow like weeds, and look way better than fences, but must be trimmed every couple years. These are big leaf, soft leaf type, not the tough, "tear your arm off" fir type. I should be able to name the hedge I am referring to, but I am too busy working metal.
All depends where you are.
Down here we call hedges WICKS cause as the wild fire passes buy it ignites the hedge which then burns down the house that would have otherwise been bypassed.
I have always prefferred a screen of mixed Summer & Winter flowering shrubs with some shade loving understory on the shade side and sun lovers of the sunny side.
Planted in small groups of similar plants.
Thus when one plant dies, it can get replaced and not look out of place.
Got a couple of city people living in their "country houses" with miles of Buxes ( Box ) hedges which always look schitt because there is always one plant that is sick.
They spends a lot more on maintaining their hedges than they would have on a fence.
Over the road is a bloke with "hedges" made from a variety of fruit trees all growing between each other with some Magnolias dispersed between them, apples, pears & citrus.
The sunny side had Passionfruit growing through the "hedge".