Australia

Has a passion for old roses, cottage gardens, Mediterranean climate perennials,colourful Australian native plants. I also love modern shrub roses that act like old roses, but flower more.
Why old roses? For their generousness of size and proliferation of blooms. For their romance and history. They are more like large flowering shrubs rather than a collection short canes of the modern hybrid tea type roses. For their voluptuous and romantic shapes and distinctive colours in a palette that soothes the eyes. For evocative and varied fragrances that fill the air with their heavenly scent. For their ability to survive and even thrive on neglect if need be but respond to the smallest amount of attention from their owners. For their lack of need of high quantities of fertilizer, pruning or any spray regime in order to look and smell beautiful.

Our rose garden has many varieties which put on a voluptuous spring display and then go on to provide blooms right throughout the year, including some over winter too. The roses are ably supported by their flowering companion plants which marry the roses to the landscape and help to provide seasonal interest and even the occasional herb and vegetable too. Old roses love to be grown organically.
Hybrid Perpetuals, Bourbons, Teas, Chinas, Hybrid Musks and Shrub Roses are my favourite rose families for their generousness of blooms and fragrance all year round. I provide photos here of my garden and roses, in order to further people's knowledge and interest in old roses, many of which were almost lost to commercial rose production.

I have recently published the book 'The Year of Talking To Plants' by me Sarah Rajkotwala, combining my interest in new age spirituality and metaphysics with gardening, fairies and gardens.

Experienced

Author, Photographer

Last visit: More than a year ago