Awesome! I just bought 3 bushes. two pink lemonade and a delite. I am like you. I am not sure which varieties are best even though my grandpa grows a ton of bushes. but he lives too far away and can't maintain them anymore. I am probably going to buy a few more varieties and see 3 years from now which ones I like

@Ann Marie, I have a few climbers and ramblers on a trellis and my best advice is to make sure your rose is hardy for your climate by choosing ones that are atleast one or two hardiness zones below yours. That’s the best way to ensure cane survival through winter (right plant, right place). If the rose is near a wall that retains and reflect heat, then I do zone push and have had success with climbers my zone or one zone above. For example, I’m in zone 4b and I have no problems with New Dawn and James Galway surviving winter without protection on a northwest and southwest wall, respectively. As for training the rose, my approach is to tie the canes tight against the support so that it is secure and doesn’t whip around or rub. I do this in the late winter / early spring when the rose is dormant along with pruning so that I can see the rose’s framework. It also means that I’m working with only hardened canes (I never tie soft or semi-hard canes). I use simple garden twine and tie tight double knots. I don’t skimp and make sure the final rose frame work absolutely does not move. I tie the largest, most established canes to the support first, then the rest. I may even tie smaller canes to the bigger ones. Yes, it’s “crossing branches” but so long as they are tied tight and not rubbing, I find it’s totally fine. Key is no movement of any of those framework canes. I intentionally use twine because it blends in, is cheap, and will eventually degrade (since I do this all over again every winter/spring). If the rose cane is really old and has a tough bark and I know it’s not going to expand, then I tie into the support with black zip ties (gasp!). I’ll also mention that optimal blooms form on canes that are positioned between horizontal and 45 degrees. Here’s a pic of my William Baffin climber last year on a wooden trellis.

I think probably Grande Dame is the better choice for both disease resistance and fragrance. I now have Grande Dame and It is proving to be a very good rose. In the past I’ve had MAAB, and I like it, but it was never very fragrant. I will admit that the first couple of seasons some of the stems were a little weak on GD so the huge blooms could be kind of floppy at times, that seems to have corrected itself now that it’s more established. .

Thanks all for the wonderful recommendations -- I really appreciate it! I've called around to a few local garden centers and one has some David Austin roses in stock and will be getting more varieties within the coming weeks, so I plan on checking back frequently to see if they have something that will suit my needs. Otherwise, I might wait to order online later this year and delay planting by a year to get exactly what I want for the space. I'm definitely rethinking the arborvitaes too since it sounds like they'd crowd my roses too much, so may plant a hedge row of 4 or so rose shrubs instead to make sure they have enough space/light. Thanks again all for weighing in! I'm diving back into the rose research and reading up on the gorgeous types suggested here -- Cheers!