This is usually the first rose to bloom in my garden, sending out multiple buds in February, and when they are open on the cool spring mornings, the fragrance is unbelievable. Soft and powdery at first, yet rich with complex spicy notes. Some roses just give away their beauty at first glance, but in every sense this rose has layers of beauty and sensuality. I spent the late afternoon with my nose stuck in in one of its thick blooms. Like all intoxicating fragrances, it brings up memories. The first is my grandmother's hand lotion. This is the scent that...…

This is a beautiful Polyantha rose, a group of roses with petite blossoms and form. Although not quite miniature roses, they are quite different than your average rose shrub. (As if roses are anything average!) Other famous Polyanthas include Cecile Brunner, Marie Pavie and her sister Marie Daly, Pinkie and The Fairy. While most of the time they are diminutive in form, barely reaching above three or four feet, many of them have been developed as climbing sports; Cecile Brunner's climbing variety tends to be more popular than its original compact shrub. I can't imagine why one wouldn't just love...…

My one-year-old Duchesse de Brabant is bound to become my favorite rose. I have only seen about five blooms total on it but it is just one of those promises of greatness. Already it grows in a shape that I like, tall but elegantly loose. Unlike Hybrid Teas or my favorite David Austin "Heritage" rose, it is not stiff, nor are the blooms upright cups. It is not slouchy, though. I guess I would describe it the way a bias-cut silk dress fits, shaped but draping and billowing when it needs to. So I added another one this fall to...…

Yesterday I made my long-awaited first visit to the Antique Rose Emporium in Independence, Texas. Last fall it first dawned on me that I too could grow roses, where my gardening had previously been limited to wildflowers, a few native plants here and there, and other seemingly low-impact, low-maintenance gardening. Then I decided to buy a rose for my birthday and in my trying to pick one, I ended up with two, and a week later, a third. Roses had previously seemed to me the haute couture of the gardening world, rarefied and unattainable and perhaps not worth even looking...…

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