Augusta Luise

Bolero

Stunning .....every single one of them❤️

PAoK

Pretty Lady Rose (with Desdemona and PAoK first photo)

Pretty Lady Rose with Desdemona

Grandiflora rose Arizona

Bolero, mass planting view

Lovely photos, everyone.

Dillybeans, how would you describe the fragrance of Windermere? I love those globular booms.

Rose - fabulous Augusta Luise blooms!!! I'd tip my hat if I had a hat. :) Ooooh! Your Bolero is divine! And they keep getting better!! Man, you can grow roses well!

Hugo - Your Golden Zest and Secret...oh my!!! :) :)

So many incredible roses! You are all growing such beautiful and fragrant roses .

Olivia Austin

Lady of Shallot

Quietness

Gruss an Aachen

RoseCanadian I know, chocolate seems odd in association with a rose scent but that is what my nose said on first whiff. It is a complex scent Queen Of Elegance has. Kristine, so glad to see you've included Lady Of Shalott rose. I've just planted that one too. It is getting established with no buds yet. Glad to see you think it has fragrant blooms. Dillybeansown your photo of Windermere had me researching it. Excellent disease resistance. This rose is now on my Want list! So beautiful.

Kristine - your Gruss is awash with beauty!!! Oh my!!

Darragh - Mine still doesn't have any buds...but I'm so eager to smell it!

bump this up to admire the pics. Also to add Versigny, most delicious scent like an apricot pie and heaven itself. Versigny had very healthy leaves, zero blackspots. Died twice in my zone 5a & grew it back in 2013. I tried to order again, but Roses Unlimited doesn't offer it this year. Below was Versigny in my rock hard clay & steep hill. Did best in fast-draining soil.

Versigny is among the top 5 scents of my 150+ fragrant own-root roses. Its scent is 10 times better than Carding Mill (myrrh), and twice better than Crown Princess Mag.

Beautiful, Straw! I love the color so much! :) :)

This is a wonderful topic, the photos are ravishing.

My sweet Japanese neighbor Koko is a floral designer. Her apartment and yard are like walking into a magazine. She owned a big house and yard full of roses before she moved here to the senior apartments. She hasn't planted any roses yet and wanders over to see what I am up to . The one rose I had in bloom last year she admired most, and asked about it a few days ago so she could get one is EVELYN, my most elegant rose.

But Evelyn may lose the title after what is coming this year, we'll see.

Anywhere I can buy Versigny today?
Carla in Sac

Did you check with rose Unlimited ?

I am not sure what elegant means in describing a rose, but I understand scent. The Prince has scent, and on a still day its scent wafts through the air, such that I do not have to hold my nose to a rose bud to smell it. It is the red rose here. My eye says the rose is purple except in photographs.

Mark - yeah...I have trouble photographing purples/reds too. Reallly looks lovely with the yellow. :)

BerryPie

Thanks for the tip-- I sent an email inquiring if they ship to California!

Carla in Sac

Carla: they do! I've been a happy customer of Roses Unlimited for >20 years.

Blue moon keeps flowering and smells great.

Quietness is a fragrant elegant rose.

Gardening Teenager - I love the color of your Blue Moon roses!

Kristine - yes, that looks elegant. :) :)

Gardening Teenager, I definitely need Blue Moon

Thanks for enabling me

It's a beauty, just needs a little love. I did my research before I bought it!

Here is a vote for Bathsheba and La France.

...and how could I forget Jacques Cartier aka Marchessa Boccella!

For me, it must be Mademoiselle Franziska Krüger. A beauty I can not resist.

Feiy - oh that's fabulous!!! I want one!! :) :)

Mademoiselle Franziska Kruger was in stock for the longest time at Antique Rose Emporium, and just when I went to finalize my order she was gone.

I don't know why I procrastinate for years on the ones that I want the most. Can you believe her buds ? This one really knows how to tug the heart.

That makes me sad to hear. May be they will get her back in stock again.

Sorry Vaporvac- I'm pretty sure MFK is a staple rose they carry every year at ARE, but I suppose that could change. I chronically keep it on my wish list at their site. It's such a gamble to wait all year for the sale , then to my knowledge there wasn't a Black Friday or Valentine's day free shipping sale.

Mademoiselle FK and Francis Dubreuil are always the " ones that got away ", I better get serious if I ever want to see them in my garden.

@berrypiez6b Mine comes from RVR. Although it takes her 2 years to reach 2' high, maybe you could use RVR as a backup for purchases. Hope you can get the ones you want the most soon.

Feiy Lo , thank you for mentioning RVR. I've never purchased from them but they sure have some wonderful roses.

It's not everyone's cup of tea but I LOVE small , the shorter the better for my little garden.

"Here is a vote for Bathsheba and La France."

How does La France do in Zone 6? And do you know a good source for one (I have heard there are multiple cultivars floating around, some rather wimpy)?

It does fine interms of hardiness. I got mine from HCR.

Steve Mazza Antique Rose Emporium has Climbing La France (more vigor), their deadline for order is May 24. Antique rose 2-gallon is $23 and 4 times heavier than the one-gallon of Roses Unlimited. I am very impressed with ARE's stem many times thicker than RU's.

Thanks for that suggestion, Straw. I am thinking more for next year, so I didn't order any new plants at this time. I find La France kind of intriguing for its aesthetic qualities. Then it gets into a mystery of which cultivar you get if you buy one, which I also find intriguing. If I get one, I would be targeting a look like these full, fat blooms here (photo from American Rose Society). Amazing. :)

Or here:

No offense intended to Antique Rose Emporium, but their website photo is a bit less exciting. Maybe more realistic for the average plant, I don't know.

High Country's photo is a bit closer:

I read through all the References on HelpMeFind's page for La France, and found this one toward the end quite interesting.

"The La-France-Sickness is not a general one. In my garden are vigorous, La France-Roses full of health. This Rose has been much sinned against. Before Caroline Testout came on the market, La France was grown heavily for container culture. In order to obtain many plants, all were grafted and the weakest eyes utilized. This process continued for many years, the weakest eyes of the weak plants were repeatedly used until the sort was fully exhausted.
I blame this type of exploitation for a good portion of the La-France-sickness."

This guy (Robert Betten, from a century and a half ago) seems to be saying that the apparently different forms of this rose are clones of clones of clones that have mutated enough to be rather different from each other.

The second video on this page discusses it briefly.

Steve, I would not let an ARE photo deter you from buying their climbing LaFrance. Many vendors don't use the best photos of a plant.

Thanks, Sheila. I find that a bit puzzling. On one hand, David Austin invariably uses top-quality photos. Maybe the best photo taken of the best plant they have, on the best day of the year. Then some other vendors have photos that seem almost to be an afterthought. In most cases, I wouldn't be bothered. In the particular case of La France, because of the known variability, it gives me a bit of pause. But I still might give it a try next year. There are a few other vendors that carry it as well, but none seems to give it much emphasis.

Steve, DA is really "selling" roses. Some of the other vendors are offering OGRs to people who have sought them out because of their love for roses and antique roses. They can find photos on HMF roses of the particular varieties. The photo is an afterthought.

A good point, and duly noted. I just want to add, as a person who is rather new to this pursuit, I am constantly learning about new varieties and old (but new to me) varieties. The OGRs and "old modern" roses don't have any patent holders to be their champions. A bit of marketing could help ensure their continued life in the gardens of the next generation. A nice photo can give people like me, or younger, a reason to want an OGR, instead of just buying DA's next rose. Give people a chance to fall in love with it.

Speaking of OGRs, my favorite fragrant, elegant super-healthy hybrid tea is Radiance and all of its sports. The bush itself is elegant and healthy-- lovely olive green leaves. It is always the first hybrid tea to bloom in my garden; the three plants have survived over 15 years in my garden. More information here: https://www.helpmefind.com/rose/l.php?l=2.5059.1&tab=36&qn=3&qc=2

After a bit of thought, I realized my most elegant rose is Dakota Redwing. It is red-black with purple mauve undertones in my SoCal garden, petal packed with a med-light but very consistent old-rose-fruity fragrance. The petals have a velvety sheen, which the camera can’t capture. I also find the bright yellow stamens peaking out toward the end of each bloom’s life to be incredibly beautiful and adding to its elegance. I purchased mine from Rouge Valley Roses.

That is top of my wish list. I think rogue valley is the only place that carries it as far as I know.

Stephanie - ooooh!!! Now that's a gorgeous red rose!! Love it!

So, I didn't mean to hijack the thread, but I kind of gave you an answer already (La France). The term elegant may be a bit vague in this context, or in general. (I know it when I see it!) To me, I think it means graceful, refined, a bit formal, and abundant.

La France looks very elegant to my eyes, and reportedly smells great. So it's on my wishlist for those reasons:

I know a few others that look elegant to me and have good fragrance:

Yves Piaget (I really want this, but I don't think it will live through my winter outdoors):

Variegata di Bologna (yes, it's more or less a once-bloomer):

Eden (AKA Pierre de Ronsard):

Soeur Emmanuelle (AKA Cathedral Bells):

There are probably more, but that's what I can think of for now.

Elegance and fragrance…I think my vote will have to go to Bolero. It has the most romantic form with the delicate shading during cooler weather. The fragrance is incredible too!

Quietness has that classic beauty with health and fragrance (also exceptionally winder hardy) so it’s a solid choice. I have it in full sun and it never has a lick of disease to it. One of my few I can rely on for health.

I, too too, have to go with Bolero! although…it’s the only ine blooming for me yet, here on the east coast. i love how different in color each one can be, i love its form, and boy is it fragrant!

here comes the photo dump…