I would deliberately make an all-pink bed if I were you--and plant a lot of white hardy garden geranium in between some of the pink roses. That will be a sight--pink and white lace! A couple white daylilies and maybe a couple white mums in there for some white later in the season after the hardy geraniums have quit blooming. Really--what a gorgeous sight--pink rose bed surrounded by white lace!

Then I'd stick Lady of Shalott separately somewhere off in the middle of the yard--as a showy specimen of a contrasting color. And add the purples around her. Dramatic!

Do show us some pics next summer!

Kate

This post was edited by dublinbay on Fri, Feb 21, 14 at 9:46

If you REALLY like pink, you can never have too much pink.

Kate, now that's a great idea! I might have to consider that. Now where to put Lady of Shallot though? I bought her this year due to your recommendations and your beautiful pics btw.

I'm so excited to start gardening again and plant my new roses! I think it's so fun just planning the garden and mail order shopping.

Terri

It can be tricky when you have warm pinks (shading towards apricot), next to cool lilac shades. I once grew Queen Elizabeth (a pure clear pink) next to a pale coral colour and another which faded to a parchment tone.....along with Blue Moon......with the vivid pink tones of Zepherine Drouhin muscling into the vista - a horrible sickly combo which lasted only one season. However, lots of green (and white) will mediate between the shades, buffering the worst clashes.

campanula is right, which is why I stick with the cool pinks, which are my favorites anyway, and then it doesn't matter whether they're light pink, medium pink or almost purplish. I also plant companion plants in between, such as white and fuchsia zonal geraniums, purple sea lavender, and reblooming irises of different colors. I made the mistake at first of adding some yellow and apricot flowers and couldn't figure out for some time what was wrong, but when I did and took them out the whole garden bed looked immediately so much better and more cohesive. Such a simple concept, but what a difference it made to the look of the garden. Some people successfully intermix many different colors in a sort of Persian tapestry effect, but you have to have an eye for color and like the look that it produces. I can admire it in others' gardens but know it wouldn't work in mine, since I live among hills and all that color would clash horribly with the wild background.

Ingrid

You can never have enough pink or white roses. Feel free to shop away.

Here are the famous pink roses of Kazanlak, Bulgaria that give the treasured rose oil that costs more by weight than gold.

Kittymoonbeam, those pink roses are beautiful. They are hard to resist!

Ingrid and Campanula, thanks for the tip of not mixing cool pinks with warm shades. I will have to give this more thought and look at these colors again. What do you think about keeping the warm tones to one end of the garden and cool at the other? I guess I would consider Boscobel to be more of a warm tone with the salmon in it and Heritage to be cool. Do you agree?

Terri

yes, Heritage is cool pink and Boscobel is warm if it has coral tones. If you are going to add one orange, I would do warm pinks as they will agree with the orange better. If you do cool pinks use white or lavender instead of orange.

If you have a predominant color trend (say, cool pinks), you could slip a few warmish pinks (but not deep or neon bright pink) in there if you have a big enough bed of pinks. If we are talking about combining just 3-4 pinks roses, I'd stick to pretty much one shade of pink--but I guess I had the impression that you would be planting 8-10 pink roses in a bed--in which case I would go for a little variety by sticking a Boscabel or two in it.

I remember once seeing a picture of a lovely rose garden--except that down in the corner there was a rose which had some apricot in it and seemed to clash with the peacefulness of the rest of the pink garden. I put my thumb over the clashing apricot/pink rose--and the rest of the picture went absolutely flat and boring--no life left in that garden. Took my thumb off the apricot/pink and the whole garden lit up with life again. From that I learned a lesson--just sticking in even one slightly clashing plant can liven up the whole garden. Of course, some color combinations work better that way than others do. And it is just possible that what looked boring to me would have translated as serene to someone else.

At any rate, do not put Lady of Shalott in that mixture--I don't think she will work, colorwise at all. And her color and shape are good enough that I think she will work fine by herself (which is how I have her growing, by the way).

Kate

I do prefer the warm tones rather than the cool pinks, so I am going to try to make that my focus in this garden. I hope I can pull it off, but I'm ok with moving something if it just doesn't work. Thanks everyone for your input. I will post some pictures this summer!

Terri

I planted my new rose garden all in containers because we live in a condo. As a mosaic artist I am also aware of colors. Personally, I would not want a garden filled with all of one color of roses. I purchased my 16 roses very carefully and placed their pots in a special order. I started with deep apricot, Just Joey, on the outside of my semi circle, then to a softer version then to a soft yellow then soft pink ,and finally white. In the center of this is a red and a purple for punch! I find that all of one color blends together too much for my taste. I love Impressionist paintings and I guess that influences my garden. Most of all I do think everyone should plant the roses that give them the most pleasure. Enjoy whatever roses you choose and take time to sit and look at them at least every week. My favorite time is in the quiet of mornings when my dog, Jake and I go out into this garden for morning coffee. Good luck, Judith Piazza

I have pinks as the main color in my gardens across the front of the house. I go from cool pinks (including brights) to warm pinks, with each taking up half the garden. They are only separated by my relatively small entry porch. It works really well!

I go from Blossomtime and Weeping China Doll to Colette and Paul Bocuse if that helps anyone picture the ranges I used :) I use blues and purples for the main colors of the perennials, with a lot of white to still be added. I figured I could always find the right shade of white filler plants, lol. I've been collecting the perfect colors so far!

I love pink roses! Most of my roses are pink, I also have apricot color. I mix the soft apricot Austins with all shades of pink.

I'm adding Royal Jubilee to the garden this spring, really looking forward to seeing it in bloom.

I don't grow Lady of Shallot or Boscobel....

My Member page lists my roses, I grow a number of Austins, wonderful roses.

The Alnwick Rose

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Bishop's Castle

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Evelyn

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If you like pink, go for it! Do what makes YOU happy and don't worry about what others think. It's your garden and the only one it needs to please is YOU! I never go with color schemes. Mother Nature never does so why should I? Besides, the best laid plans always seem to get mixed up later on anyway so I quite trying to "plan" my garden a long time ago. Things go where ever I can put them regardless of color. It all seems to work out in the end and next season something will happen and I'll have to make changes again. It's how gardens evolve.

First and foremost, I believe it comes down to what you love to surround yourself with. seil is happy with different colors mixed together, and from what I've seen of her garden it works beautifully. She probably has a good eye for color and subconsciously chooses roses that look good together even if not aware of that on a conscious level. Terri likes warm pinks while I adore the cool ones, and Meredith has cleverly combined both by separating them with her entry porch. We each have a different style that works for us.

The other consideration is the background in which you plant roses. If you have a smaller garden in the suburbs you can probably do whatever you prefer without worrying about clashing with a larger background. Part of my backyard is a wild, boulder-strewn hill and the surrounding scenery is natural, with hardly a house in view. Most of my less than two acres has been left natural with the garden only on the flat area surrounding the house. For that reason it's very important to me to make the garden blend with the landscape. mendocino rose, with vastly larger amounts of land and a huge number of roses, has chosen a different path by making her rose garden a separate entity, with soft and bright colors mixed together. It works beautifully because she has over 1500 roses which can easily be seen as separate from their hilly background because of the huge impact that large number of roses makes.

Fortunately, there's something for everyone, which is what makes looking at others' gardens so fascinating. There are endless ways to incorporate roses into a garden, just as there are endless numbers of gardeners to implement those ways.

Ingrid

Krista, those are some great pictures of your Austins. I particularly love Evelyn!

Ingrid, I think you hit the nail on the head when you said "we each have a different style that works for us". If it doesn't work out the first time I'm not opposed to moving things around. I've done that many times in my other gardens.

Seil, thanks so much for your encouragement. You are so right! Ultimately,this garden is for my enjoyment. I'm going to pick out the flowers
that make me happy!

Terri

I don't think there can be too much pink. But as someone noted above, it can be livened up with a touch of a clashing color (not a lot, just a spot). Like those old landscape paintings that always had a touch of red if you looked closely.

I saw a beautiful public rose garden at Farmingdale on Long Island that had large, all-pink beds (i think it was Carefree Beauty) capped at the ends with sparkling Red-Cascade. I never would have thought that anything so simple could be so beautiful. I heard the gardener/designer left Farmingdale a year or so later for a horticultural job in the UK.

Of course if it were me, I would want a lot of miscellaneous fragrant plants with personal associations, without much attention to design or color.

It just occurred to me that my front garden, which is white, cool pink and lavender (albeit with a clump of yellow reblooming irises in the middle) has as its backdrop a large bush of Mutabilis which has multicolored single roses, with almost flame colored buds and flowers that change to soft apricot and pink and finish off with a deep pink. The fact that these are single roses in a large expanse of green keeps this from being garish or strange, while at the same time adding that enlivening note that others have mentioned. The bottom line remains the same: Plant what you love!

Ingrid

Almost all my roses are pink, with a few white and purple/red. I love old fashioned roses and most of the ones we can grow, come in these colors.

Pink roses are so pretty and they look great with lots of lavenders, purples, white, blues, and even clear red. I have some Jacob Kline bee balm, daisies and lavender with some pink roses and they are beautiful together :)

I agree with the others. Do a rose combination that suits your tastes. I am definitely into pinks. At least 40 of the many I grow are pinks. I have an all pink bed with Belinda's Dream,Madame Lombard and the magenta pink Pioneer rose Thomas Affleck.

Another pink bed has Belinda's Dream, Sharifa Asma and soon La France. Dusty miller is my accent in Summer and White Mums in Spring and Fall. Pink is gorgeous if you love it. Lots of us ladies certainly do. Never too much.....