Rendering templates preformances - wpf

Question

I created a propertyGrid like.
I used an Item control which uses a viewmodel object.
The VM object has the property to be display and its relevant DataTemplates.
Everything wosrk fine. My Property grid actually act like the VS property grid
My problem is that every time the use changes the selected object (which lead to changes in the property grid) its took to much time (depends on the amount of the selected object properties). I figured out that the reason for the bad performances is the templates loading and rendering.
so I thought that I may solve this issues by creating real controls for each object, and not just uses templates. (Create buttons and text box for each property) this will solve the loading time, I hope..
1- is there any way to creates real controls (in code) using data templates?
2- is there any other way to improve the performances of my Property grid?
The main code for the propGrid is attached to this post
Thanks, Leon
CODE:
<DataTemplate x:Key="gridItemsControl" >
<Grid Visibility="{Binding Visibility}">
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition MinWidth="60" MaxWidth="350" Width="{Binding Source={StaticResource firstCulWidth},Path=Width,Mode=TwoWay,UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged,Converter={StaticResource widthToGridLenConverter}}"/>
<ColumnDefinition/>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<Border Grid.Column="0" BorderBrush="#ff333333" BorderThickness="0.5" Grid.ColumnSpan="2"
Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter},ConverterParameter=Category}">
<StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal" Background="#FFA9BFD4" Height="25">
<Expander Template="{StaticResource SimpleExpanderTemp}" ExpandDirection="Left" IsExpanded="{Binding IsExpanded, Mode=TwoWay,UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}" Margin="3,0,5,0"/>
<Label Content="{Binding Path=CategoryName,Converter={StaticResource propertyNameToDiplayNameConverter}}" FontSize="12" Foreground="White" VerticalAlignment="Top" />
</StackPanel>
</Border>
<Border Grid.Column="0" BorderBrush="#ff333333" BorderThickness="0.5"
Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter}}">
<Label Margin="5,0,0,0" Content="{Binding Path=DisplayName,Converter={StaticResource propertyNameToDiplayNameConverter}}"/>
</Border>
<GridSplitter Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0" Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter}}" HorizontalAlignment="Right" Width="4" Background="Transparent"/>
<Border Grid.Column="1" BorderBrush="#ff333333" BorderThickness="0.5"
Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter}}">
<ContentPresenter Grid.Column="1" Margin="10,1,10,1" HorizontalAlignment="Left"
ContentTemplate="{Binding Path=InlineTemplate}" />
</Border>
</Grid>
</DataTemplate>
Update: Here is the container
<ItemsControl Name="propsDataGrid" ItemsSource="{Binding Properties}" ItemTemplate ="{StaticResource gridItemsControl}">
<ItemsControl.ContextMenu>
<ContextMenu>
<MenuItem Header="Close all expanders" Click="MenuItem_Click" Visibility="{Binding IsAlphaBeticSort,Converter={StaticResource boolToVisConverter},ConverterParameter=VisForFalse}"></MenuItem>
<MenuItem Header="Expand all" Name="mnExpandeAll" Click="mnExpandeAll_Click" Visibility="{Binding IsAlphaBeticSort,Converter={StaticResource boolToVisConverter},ConverterParameter=VisForFalse}"></MenuItem>
</ContextMenu>
</ItemsControl.ContextMenu>
<ItemsControl.ItemsPanel>
<ItemsPanelTemplate>
<StackPanel/>
</ItemsPanelTemplate>
</ItemsControl.ItemsPanel>
<!--<ItemsControl.ItemTemplate>
<DataTemplate >
<Grid Visibility="{Binding Visibility}">
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition MinWidth="60" MaxWidth="350" Width="{Binding Source={StaticResource firstCulWidth},Path=Width,Mode=TwoWay,UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged,Converter={StaticResource widthToGridLenConverter}}"/>
<ColumnDefinition/>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<Border Grid.Column="0" BorderBrush="#ff333333" BorderThickness="0.5" Grid.ColumnSpan="2"
Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter},ConverterParameter=Category}">
<StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal" Background="#FFA9BFD4" Height="25">
<Expander Template="{StaticResource SimpleExpanderTemp}" ExpandDirection="Left" IsExpanded="{Binding IsExpanded, Mode=TwoWay,UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}" Margin="3,0,5,0"/>
<Label Content="{Binding Path=CategoryName,Converter={StaticResource propertyNameToDiplayNameConverter}}" FontSize="12" Foreground="White" VerticalAlignment="Top" />
</StackPanel>
</Border>
<Border Grid.Column="0" BorderBrush="#ff333333" BorderThickness="0.5"
Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter}}">
<Label Margin="5,0,0,0" Content="{Binding Path=DisplayName,Converter={StaticResource propertyNameToDiplayNameConverter}}"/>
</Border>
<GridSplitter Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0" Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter}}" HorizontalAlignment="Right" Width="4" Background="Transparent"/>
<Border Grid.Column="1" BorderBrush="#ff333333" BorderThickness="0.5"
Visibility ="{Binding IsCategoryItem,Converter={StaticResource isCategoryItemToVisibilityConverter}}">
<ContentPresenter Grid.Column="1" Margin="10,1,10,1" HorizontalAlignment="Left"
ContentTemplate="{Binding Path=InlineTemplate}" />
</Border>
</Grid>
</DataTemplate>
</ItemsControl.ItemTemplate>-->
</ItemsControl>

Answer 1

DataTemplates create "real controls" there is no gain in doing something manually which is done automatically using templates, the only thing you should worry about is virtualization (so that the controls for properties not in view are not created) and how your templates are wired up so that their creation is not triggered needlessly.
(By the way, the way you create the grid, setting its width, looks like it might be redundant, you probably can just share the size.)
To make an ItemsControl virtualize the items you need to:
Set the ItemsPanel to a VirtualizingStackPanel
Have a control template which contains a ScrollViewer around the ItemsPresenter where the VirtualizingStackPanel will be.
Set ScrollViewer.CanContentScroll to true to enable scrolling by item which allows for virtualization.
e.g.
<ItemsControl ItemsSource="{Binding Items}"
ScrollViewer.CanContentScroll="True">
<ItemsControl.Template>
<ControlTemplate>
<Border Name="Bd" Background="{TemplateBinding Background}"
BorderBrush="{TemplateBinding BorderBrush}"
BorderThickness="{TemplateBinding BorderThickness}" SnapsToDevicePixels="true"
Padding="1">
<ScrollViewer Padding="{TemplateBinding Padding}" Focusable="false">
<ItemsPresenter SnapsToDevicePixels="{TemplateBinding SnapsToDevicePixels}" />
</ScrollViewer>
</Border>
</ControlTemplate>
</ItemsControl.Template>
<ItemsControl.ItemsPanel>
<ItemsPanelTemplate>
<VirtualizingStackPanel />
</ItemsPanelTemplate>
</ItemsControl.ItemsPanel>
<!-- ... -->
</ItemsControl>
If this is still too slow you could make the whole ItemsControl part of a template which applies per type as presumably the contents of this grid are dependent on the type of the item, thus a different grid should only be created if the item-type changes, also you might be able to cache the resulting templates as well (i never tried doing that though).