When is it the best time to prune a laurel hedge? It's a big hedge and we don't want to encourage any more growth !! ::)
There is no real worry of doing any damage to laurel with 'bad timing'. As long as you don't disturb any nesting birds, there is no reason why you could not do it now.
We did ours hard a couple of weeks ago. It looked tatty to start but is looking so much better now, a couple of weeks on. You can be pretty rough with them and they soon bud up and fill out again.
If you don't want it to grow further, summer is the time. If you get it now, the strength of the plant is in the shoots and leaves, so you weaken it a little, and it won't grow back as strongly. Which is what you want.
We just treat it as a hedge, when it gets tall we chop, never even thought about the right time.Mr PKL attacks it when he feels like it! several times a year. Still alive!