The Best Fragrance Rose Collection

Preparing the Soil for Roses
Roses grow best in fertile, moisture-retentive but well-drained soil. Before planting, dig the soil thoroughly, remove weeds and incorporate plenty of well-rotted garden compost or manure to improve the soil structure and fertility.

Choosing a Position
Choose a position with good light and air circulation where you can make the most of the fragrance. These roses will flower best with plenty of sunshine, but can also be grown in light partial shade. Plant ‘Scent From Heaven’ beside a sturdy support such as a wall, fence, arch or pergola where its long stems can be trained as they grow.

Planting Bare-Root Roses
Unpack bare-root roses promptly and soak the roots in a bucket of water for a couple of hours before planting. Dig a generous hole wide enough for the roots to spread naturally without bending or bunching them. Position the rose with the graft union around soil level, backfill with soil, firm gently and water thoroughly.

Planting Potted Roses
Water the rose thoroughly before planting. Dig a hole slightly wider than the root ball, remove the pot and gently loosen any tightly packed roots. Plant at the same depth it was growing in the pot, backfill with soil, firm gently and water well.

Watering
Water regularly during the first growing season, particularly during warm, dry weather. Give the soil a thorough soak so moisture reaches down to the roots rather than watering little and often.

Feeding & Mulching
Apply a rose feed as growth gets underway in spring and again after the first main flush of flowers. Mulch around the base with well-rotted garden compost or organic matter to help conserve moisture, suppress weeds and improve the soil.

Top Tip
If you're growing ‘Scent From Heaven’ against a wall, remember that the soil immediately beneath walls can be surprisingly dry. Plant a little way out from the base and angle the stems back towards the support, making sure the roots receive plenty of water while establishing.

Pruning Bush Roses
Prune ‘Arthur Bell’ and ‘Pure Poetry’ in late winter or early spring. Remove dead, damaged, weak or crossing stems first, then shorten healthy growth to encourage strong new flowering shoots and maintain an open, balanced plant.

Pruning ‘Scent From Heaven’
Treat ‘Scent From Heaven’ as a climbing rose. Once established, retain the main framework of strong stems and shorten flowering side shoots rather than cutting the whole plant back like a bush rose. Remove dead, damaged or very weak growth and replace an occasional old main stem with fresh growth when needed.

Training Your Climbing Rose
Tie new stems of ‘Scent From Heaven’ to its support using soft garden ties. Training some stems horizontally or at an angle encourages flowering shoots to develop along more of their length, giving you flowers across the support rather than mainly at the top.

Deadheading
Remove faded flowers regularly to encourage further flushes and keep the plants looking tidy. Cut spent flower stems back to a strong, healthy leaf.

Keeping Roses Healthy
Remove fallen leaves and unhealthy foliage from around the plants and keep the surrounding area free from weeds. An open framework and good airflow through the foliage will also help keep plants healthy.

Top Tip
Don't let the strongest new stems on ‘Scent From Heaven’ grow straight upwards if you have room to train them outwards. Spreading them across the support creates a broader framework and encourages flowers over a larger area.

Plant Where You'll Enjoy the Fragrance
Make fragrance part of the planting plan by growing these roses close to places where you naturally spend time or walk past. ‘Arthur Bell’ and ‘Pure Poetry’ work well in borders near paths and seating areas, while ‘Scent From Heaven’ can bring flowers and fragrance to an arch, pergola, wall or fence.

Perennial Planting Partners
Nepeta, hardy geraniums and salvias make excellent companions around the bush roses, adding softer flowers around their base without competing with the main display. Lavender can also work well where conditions are sunny and well drained.

Work With the Colours
Golden-yellow ‘Arthur Bell’, deep-magenta ‘Pure Poetry’ and coral-apricot ‘Scent From Heaven’ make a colourful combination. Blues, purples and soft mauves help link the three together, while white flowers can provide a calmer contrast between the stronger colours.

Add Earlier Colour
Spring-flowering bulbs such as tulips and alliums can provide colour while the roses are putting on fresh growth, extending the display before the main rose season begins.

Top Tip
Fragrance is easiest to appreciate where the flowers are close to you. Position scented roses beside a frequently used path, seating area or garden entrance rather than tucking them away at the back of the garden.

Your Roses – Floribunda, Hybrid Tea & Climbing
This collection gives you three different ways to enjoy fragrant roses. ‘Arthur Bell’ is a Floribunda, producing generous clusters of golden-yellow flowers. ‘Pure Poetry’ is a Hybrid Tea with large, beautifully formed deep-magenta blooms on strong stems, while ‘Scent From Heaven’ is a climbing rose that can be trained upwards and across a suitable support.

Other Types of Rose

Hybrid Tea Roses
Hybrid Tea roses are prized for their large, beautifully formed flowers, usually carried individually or in small groups on strong stems. Many are highly fragrant and their strong stems make them particularly good roses for cutting.

Floribunda Roses
Floribunda roses produce their flowers in generous clusters, creating plenty of colour over a long period. They usually have a bushy habit and repeat flower through summer, making them excellent choices for beds, borders and larger containers.

Shrub Roses
Shrub roses develop into naturally shaped bushes and are particularly useful for adding height and structure to borders. Their flowers vary from simple open blooms to large, fully double roses, depending on the variety.

Climbing Roses
Climbing roses produce long flowering stems that can be trained over walls, fences, arches and other supports. They don't cling by themselves, so their stems need to be tied to a suitable support as they grow.

Rambling Roses
Rambling roses generally produce longer, more flexible stems than climbing roses and are excellent for covering larger structures, pergolas and mature trees. Many produce impressive displays of smaller flowers carried in generous clusters.

Ground Cover Roses
Ground cover roses have a low, spreading habit, making them useful towards the front of borders and for covering banks, slopes and larger areas. Planted in groups, they can create a broad carpet of flowers while helping to cover bare ground.

Flower Carpet Roses
Flower Carpet roses are a range of ground cover roses bred for their spreading habit, long flowering season and good garden performance. They're particularly useful for creating low-maintenance colour in borders, banks and larger planting schemes.

Persica Roses
Persica roses are instantly recognisable by the contrasting eye at the centre of their flowers, a characteristic inherited from Rosa persica. Modern varieties combine this unusual colouring with repeat flowering and strong garden performance.

Bare-Root Roses
Bare-root roses are supplied dormant without a pot or compost. They may look quite bare when they arrive, but this is completely normal. Once planted, they will begin producing fresh growth as temperatures rise in spring.

Potted Roses
Potted roses are supplied established in compost with a developed root system. Their appearance naturally varies through the year, so the amount of foliage, buds or flowers present will depend on the season.

If You Can't Plant Straight Away
Keep bare-root roses cool and don't allow the roots to dry out. If planting has to be delayed, heel the roots temporarily into moist soil or compost until you're ready to plant. Keep potted roses watered until they can be planted.

Mature Plant Sizes
‘Arthur Bell’ forms a bushy rose around 80cm high and 60cm wide. ‘Pure Poetry’ grows taller and more upright, reaching around 90–120cm high with a spread of around 60–90cm. ‘Scent From Heaven’ is considerably larger, producing long climbing stems that can reach around 3m when trained against a suitable support.

Growing On
Once planted, your roses will establish their roots and begin putting on fresh growth. As they mature, the plants will become fuller and more established, ready to produce generous displays of flowers each season.