by Christy Solo – Editor
With Valentine’s Day just a few days away, we’re going to paint this week’s All Things Oregon with a rosy glow.
We’ll talk briefly about why Portland is called the City of Roses and we’ll explore the Washington Park International Rose Test Garden.
Then we’ll dig into types of roses and show that things are very rosy here in our area as well as up north.
So, what’s the deal with the City of Roses?
The first rose bush to arrive in Oregon (our native roses aside) was sent to Anna Marie Pittman as a wedding gift in 1837. Cuttings from that rose were planted around the area.
By 1889 there were enough roses in and around the (not yet called) Rose City that Georgina Pittock began a social club, the Portland Rose Society.
In 1905 as part of the Lewis and Clark Exposition world’s fair Portland planted about 10K Madame Caroline Testout roses along its streets. Named for a French dressmaker, the Mme. Testout rose remains one of the most popular hybrid tea roses. Looking at the photo you can see why.
Back to 10K roses. What to do with them when the exposition closes? Portland Mayor Harry Lane announced an annual rose festival would be established – strike while the rosy iron is hot and all. The festival is still going strong today.
Still even Lane’s festival wasn’t quite enough to give the city the “City of” nickname.
The rosy moniker was finally born out of fear.
With the start of WWI and subsequent hail of bombs falling on England, English rose growers began urgently shipping rose plants to Portland hoping to prevent their hybrids from being erased from history. Thus Portland’s International Rose Test Garden rose from the literal ashes of the Great War. The City of Roses name followed close behind.
Now on to the International Rose Test Garden which is located in Washington Park in Portland.
We know how the garden began, but what exactly is a “test garden?”
The world just can’t get enough roses and new varieties – called cultivars – are continuously being created. The International Rose Test Garden is one of the places which does the testing.
The garden receives new cultivars from around the world, plants them and then evaluates several characteristics such as disease resistance, bloom formation, color and fragrance. Portland’s test garden is the oldest continuously operating public rose test garden in the U.S.
If you visit the garden, you will see over 10K rose bushes including over 610 varieties throughout the garden’s 4.5 acres. The garden is actually broken up into several gardens.
There are two terraces of test garden where the roses are identified by number not name. There’s also a Gold Award garden featuring award winning roses as. In 1975 a miniature rose garden was added to test roses of the wee variety.
The Shakespeare Garden, which has a formal walkway and raised sitting area, originally featured botanicals mentioned in Shakespeare’s plays. Now it has grown and includes summer annuals, tropical plants and year-round shrubs and roses. Naturally all the rose varieties in that garden are named for Shakespearean characters.
Most of the roses in the garden are available commercially, except, of course, the varieties being tested.
The roses bloom from May into October so you have many options for planning a 2026 visit.
We know that roses come in a wide variety of colors, sizes and cultivars, but they are also separated into classifications.
Climbing Roses: These are very tall growing versions of shrub roses. Most reach a height of 8-12’ and they need to be tied to a support such as an archway or trellis because unlike other climbing flowers such as sweet peas they won’t twine around a support on their own.
English Roses: This category was created by David Austin via breeding old roses with modern roses, selecting the best traits of each. There are also “English Inspired” roses which are often more readily available. Both often have very large flowers with lots of petals and a strong fragrance from their old rose side. Their modern side gives them smaller sized bushes, repeat blooms and a wide range of colors.
Floribunda Roses: Flowers on these roses bloom in large clusters and the open flowers are usually three to four inches across. They are lovely for arrangements and flashy gardens.
Heritage Roses: To qualify as a heritage rose a variety must have been in cultivation since at least 1867. Many of these grow in our area. They are large shrubs similar to blackberry bushes and have very fragrant blooms. With just a few exceptions, heritage roses bloom only once in spring.
Hybrid Tea and Grandiflora Roses: If you have roses, they are most likely these most popular of roses. They come in a wide variety of colors, forms, fragrances and are disease resistant.
Grandiflora were created by crossing Hybrid Tea roses with Floribundas resulting in tall plants with large cluster blooming flowers.
Landscape Roses: These can be ground cover roses or large shrubs. They are low-maintenance roses and are usually quite disease resistant.
Miniature Roses: Wonderful for areas with limited space, miniatures are tiny versions of Hybrid Tea Roses. Their open blooms are one to two inches, and they grow to 18-24 inches in height.
Rugosa Roses: Hardy and disease resistant, the most common Rugosas have five petals and come in shades of pink or white. Some repeat bloom. These will form a thicket, so they need plenty of room to grow.
Species Roses: Oregon’s native roses. They grow into large plants and bloom only once per year. Our wild species include the clustered wild rose (Rosa Pisocarpa), the nootka rose (Rosa nutkana) and the pearhip rose (Rosa woodsii).
If you want to add some rosy goodness to your garden, you don’t have to travel to Portland.
We have an amazing rose-centric nursery right here in our own backyard, the Rogue Valley Roses nursery in Medford. Per their website, Rogue Valley Roses, “maintains a garden inventory of 1,500+ roses of all classes including species and antiques such as Teas, Noisettes, Chinas, Bourbons and many others. We also have modern roses such as rare Hybrid Teas, Shrubs, Polyanthas, and most of the best Climbers and Ramblers.”
For now, Rogue Valley Roses is an online only nursery. Plan on spending quite a bit of time perusing their vast inventory. Luckily the website offers several filter options to help you narrow your choices, you can search by bloom size, bloom typer, color, fragrance, etc. The website is a bit slow in loading each new page because it is full of many photos – but if you want to find your dream rose – patience will pay off.
They offer year-round and delayed shipping – so you plant your posies at the proper time. They also have a unique version of BOGO. If you buy four “bands” (the type of pot they ship the roses in) you get one free and you have fun options. You can either pick a specific rose from their list of Free Roses or opt for a Mystery Rose and let fate decide.
Mystery roses are roses which have lost their tags, so even Rogue Valley Roses has no idea what you’ll be receiving.
Because Rogue Valley Roses has many hard-to-find varieties you may need to put your name on a waiting list for some out of stock roses, but with 1,500 varieties to choose from odds are good you’ll find some excellent immediately available options.
