This and the Antique Rose forum are my favorite websites and a source of unlimited info. You might also look at the GW gallery for pictures. If you want further help here, post your zone and/or region or city& state and maybe a few photos of your garden space..

One thing I have learned over the years is that gardening is like real estate - LOCATION is paramount. Without that, people can get all excited about some rose or other plant that is mentioned somewhere, and try it, and be disappointed again and again because it is not happy in their climate. The rose and garden information available will mention heat zones, but that is not enough. So, if you follow catsrose's suggestion and just tell us approximately where you are gardening (country? state?), we will be able to give you specific information about where to go to get inspiration for your garden that you will actually be able to use.

Jackie

Bottom line, Grace, we (like the collective we?!) think you're in the most inspirational place you'll find anywhere!!! We are at your disposal. You ask questions, and you'll find of lots of over zealous people chomping at the bit (many horse people too!) to give opinions on what will do best in your area, share photos, and rave about roses until you find you HAVE to buy them! We call ourselves "enablers", as most here are quite addicted to roses, and many of us go out and buy roses because our fellow rose addicts talk so highly about them we can't stand not having one ourselves. Ha - we are The Borg.

Yup. Here, you will find someone who is familiar with most parts of the U.S., and various other countries, too.

And that is far more valuable than books about roses which grow well somewhere other than where you are.

Jeri

To me inspiration and information are two different things. Looking at pictures of beautiful gardens is inspiring to me. Better yet are there a rose gardens that you can look at near you? I spend hours on Help Me Find.com. You can browse roses and gardens. I find Carolyn Parker's website Rose Notes inspiring. I guess it's part of Roses From A to Z. A book I like is Designing With Roses by Tony Lord. You could google some of the world's best rose gardens like Mottisfont, Sissinghurst, or the Sacramento Cemetery garden.

Here are my faves:

gardenweb
gardenista
hedgerowrose

shopterrain
williams sonoma (agrarian)
antiqueroseemporium

Also decide what you are willing and able to maintain or pay to have maintained. A neglected garden isn't always a beautiful garden.

Thank you for sharing thoses sites and books, some of them I hadn't seen before!

:) Yes you are all great enablers!! Three quarters of my wish list are thanks to this forum. Well I will let you all enable me as much as you want. Here is the information on my garden, this may get long...sorry.

I live in jeffersonville, Indiana right across the river from Louisville, ky. Zone is 6a, but to be perfectly honest I tend to find that we are in a little bubble that tends to avoid the worst of the winter weather so I have successfully had a few plants for zone 7 flourish which is tempting me to try a tea rose, just once and see how it does. WHen it comes to roses in general, my hubby demands that first and for most they have to be fragrant. We do get blackspot here which I have sprayed for(organically if possible), but I do find that regular aplications of cornmeal to the soil around my roses do help significantly.

I am a transplant to this area from tucson, az so gardening here was a big learning experience. I only have managed to keep a few of my pet cacti alive, and one spanish dagger that keeps trying. I have a nice fairly level yard most of which is nice and sunny. only an arizona native would have tried planting in the shade here which I did and which obviously failed. Like I mentioned I learned alot here, but the area has grown on me and two years ago I tore all of the beds I had put in when we moved here and redid them in a more fitting way including indulging my life long desire to have a rose garden. My first rose I got when I was 8 or 9 years old was a "joseph's coat" which met an untimly end by my grandpa's weed eater. He generally thought everything was a weed, but the rose bug lingered all these years and so far I have 40 roses and if all goes well I will be adding about that many next year.

This year however the garden was completly off limits for me due to a difficult pregnancy, so I could only watch, observe and plan. First thing I noticed is that spring was beautiful, everything I had hoped for, summer came and I started to notice that my garden lost alot of it's impact as far as color other than the roses which kept going. I need to find some rose companions that bloom during the summer and fall. Also I decided that I have to much repitition of tall spiky purple flowers which are an absolute favorite. I have hedges of lavender so I already knew this, but I need a bit more variety.

I am also adding two new beds this year, triangular in shape. The first is 6 ft, by 6 ft, by about 8.5 ft. I want to showcase rose de rescht in the center, but I haven't decided on anything besides that.

The second bed is also triangular about 10 ft on each side the only two roses I have decided on for sure are jude the obscure and lady emma hamilton. I want these two roses on each end of the bed, but would like to really showcase something special rose wise in the center of the bed. Again I havn't planned anything outside of this yet.

I generally have only own-root roses, mainly austins. But as long as it is fragrant and relativly healthy I don't mind trying other things.

Here are a few pictures in spring, that were taken before the roses and flowers really started blooming. My camera stopped working not long after so I didn't get any nice pictures this year. PLease ignore the mess in the background I wasn't allowed to clean it up this year and my husband was to busy.

ignore my neighbors red shop, we are going to put in a wooden fence this year.

This was taken just as the peonys started blooming
sorry I havn't figured out how to post more than one image per post.

My husband's favorite rose is this one "crown princess margareta" even tho I don't find it that fragrant he loves it.

cpm

This was my delightful gift from david austin roses. Molinuex tree rose that they delivered to me by mistake. UPS guy never came and picked it up so when I called DA to tell them, they told me to keep it!! It is one of my favorite roses now. In the morning that orange glowing centers just draw your attention. Any ideas for what to do under it though. Pots??

And last but certainly not least abe darby.
Ok folks, I have shared a bit of a glimpse into my messy, very much in progress garden.....Enable me!!

I look forward to any ideas and suggestions.

grace e

dregae...we are kind of neighbors! I am in Louisville, right across the river. I have really enjoyed seeing your gardens and you have a great start. I especially love your tree rose. I have never tried one before, and it is just lovely. I grow around 125 roses, give or take a few! It is a wonderful hobby for me that I have moderate success with. Always learning...and this site is so helpful. I grow a few Austins, but mostly HT`s.Unfortunately, I have no idea how to post a picture or I would share my garden with you.I really need to try and learn this. I would be happy to suggest roses I have had success with if you are interested. You have a great start to a beautiful garden and I will follow your progress with great interest. Welcome to the Ohio Valley!

Your neighbors' "red shop" is not an eyesore - I love the barn red color. After your wooden fence is in (presuming it is not so high that you cannot see the red wall) I think a row of hollyhocks would look nice in front of the fence with that barn red wall in the background - if you can't fix it, feature it!

Jackie

lesmc I would love to know what has worked for you!! and if you figure out how to share pictures I would look forward to that as well.

The wooden fence won't completly block the shop, just some of the more unsightly elements. I can't completly block it even if I wanted to it belongs to my in-laws, my little boy likes seeing his uncles and grandpa come and go.

I had one double pink hollyhock a long the fence and was debating adding more.....I think I will, see the enabling has started. Well actually I looked up the tony lord book suggested and couldn't resist buying it :) so the enabling started yesterday.

If I was starting all over, I would have put my windbreak in first. Especially with David Austin roses which don't like rough wind. If you don't have enough tall plants or structures to provide shade during hot afternoon sun fine little petals fry. Deep green provides a wonderful backdrop for light colored roses. I would include at least one tall hedge and a wall of some sort to train climbers on. We all wish we had space for another climber because they are so spectacular. If you want to have fruit trees, decide where they are going now before you place many more roses. Decide where your garden shed will be. Decide where your compost pit is going and where you want to park extra mulch, etc.

Is the big red shop to the south? If it isn't, I would plant a line of fruit trees there with a hedge of something green in front of that and then a bed of mixed roses and perennials. Another idea that always looks great is a small structure with roses growing up it and a table and chairs underneath. When you don't have a thick group of trees or a big land feature in the background, adding height really helps a garden from being dominated by other big features nearby.

Re inspiration - a book that might have good ideas re roses in your climate is "Right Rose, Right Place" by Peter Schneider, who gardens in Ohio. It is full of marvelous pictures and good advice.

I cannot stress how important it is, if you do read books or get info from sources in way different climates (such as England, for example) than yours, to "get inspired", but IGNORE most of the specific advice, as it will not be of any use to you.

I made the mistake years ago of believing rose descriptions, etc., in rose books published in England. I'm sure they were accurate in England, but in California they were a joke. So, I planted roses that either languished in misery and died, or grew literally 3-4 times larger than the book said they would!

Good luck with your garden - the pictures you posted show that it is beautiful already.

Jackie

Thank you to everyone for your comments, suggestions etc. I enjoyed the new sites and purchased a couple of the books everyone suggested.

thanks again

grace e