English Roses

A group of hybrids from the prodigious breeder David Austin of England have rapidly become the great rose success story of our time. The intention of David Austin was to develop roses that combined the intense fragrance and old floral styles of the Old European roses with the rebloom and wider color range of modern roses. Austin has certainly achieved those goals, and has produced some of the most fragrant roses ever developed. His success, however, derived in no small way from the gardening public’s change in taste toward petal-packed old roses, in rejection of the limited diet of Hybrid Tea roses offered for so long by most rose nurseries in Europe and America. The rise of heritage rose societies worldwide has continued to lead gardeners to these modern “old” roses.

We offer the English Roses under their officially registered names, or ‘breeder names’ where trademarks apply, but we have organized all of them to follow in a logical sequence based on alphabetical listing by ‘fancy name’ to make it easier to locate varieties in this book. We include a number of varieties by other breeders like Harkness, which we feel fit well in this group.