Welcome to ISCHARLIE’S Rose Balcony
Greeting everyone,
Welcome to my secondary blog of ISCHARLIEL. I opened this blog because I have such a deep passion for planting roses and sharing how it affects my lifestyle, but it might be a loose topic on my main blog. Since I already have several articles about planting rose, I thought, why not have a dedicated place to talk and document about it? Overall, it brings me here to focus on gardening and sharing all the tips, experiences, and gardening lifestyle ideas for you! It will have many pretty pictures, exciting articles, and some videos with all the beautiful visuals. Please stay around and joining La vie en rose!
The Story
How it begin?
Well, it was years ago when I still was a mid-school student (7 grade) and still don’t have any particular passion for things yet. I don’t remember how it started my love for gardening, but I remember the moment I had my first rose, which is not far from the beginning of my entire gardening history.
Back in 2011, breeder roses were first introduced to the market in Taiwan, and it was the time it became very popular in the market. It doesn’t say we have never seen roses in the nursery before, but mostly we don’t know the name, type, and where it originated. If you have visited the nurseries during that time, almost every nursery was fully packed with roses, especially David Austin English Roses and Meilland International French rose.
It was a lovely spring day. My parents decided to grab some rosemaries on our balcony because my mom loves its scent, and they even told me I could add some new flowers, too. When we arrived, next to the herbs area, it was the annual area before we visited last time, but now it is fully packed with roses. It was very pleasing to see how beautiful all the roses are in the season and the smell in the air was fantastic. I walked into the area, and there was one rose full of white bloom, planting inside a tall 12’/5 gallon pot, and it got my eyes immediately. The scent of it was so different for me because I’d never heard and smell myrrh before at that time. I asked the gardener there for its name, and they told me it is “Glamis Castle” (unfortunately, it has been discontinued), the English roses bred by David Austin. They told me it is not easy for beginners to take care of it because I don’t have too many experiences and knowledge of roses which was very accurate. Still, after some consideration and asking for more tips for taking good care of it, I decided to give it a try.
Glamis Castle. Sadly it has been discontinued. photo source
Even though I don’t have that much hard time dealing with diseases and bugs on roses until today, Glamis Castle was a nightmare for me. If you can think of any diseases and bugs on roses, it was a harsh lesson because I experienced it all! After bringing it back for two weeks, everything started to fall out. Starting with caterpillars appear, spider mites problems, cockchafers eating the roots, black spot disease makes the leaves falling, and overwater caused rotten roots. Finally, my first roses died from all of that. It might be a nightmare, but it was a good lesson for me as a beginner because I know how to deal with it all after all.
How I fall in love with rose?
The story began after after my first rose, Glamis Castle, died. Even though the first experience was not too pleasing, I visited the nursery more often, asking more questions to boost my confidence, and most importantly, to see the area fully packed with roses. Because I desperately want to grow them, I went to the bookshop for more pieces of information and knowledge. As I mentioned, roses was fully occupied the market, the popularity of roses affects the nurseries to carry more of them, also the book market. Lots of the categories that might involve gardening were all written about the life with roses, such as, of course, gardening section, interior and outdoor, crafting, food recipes, and lifestyle.
I’ve remembered I was going to redesign my balcony and get more knowledge about rose to visit the bookshop. A book in the interior section talked about how the Japanese renovated their urban concrete yard into a European cottage garden. In the book, there is a garden design that got my eyes. The garden has formed by lots of herbs and some roses, and there is a trellis full of white and pink rose on the left side of the front gate. I was amazed by how pretty the rose is and desperately want to know the name of it, luckily the next page has a description of it, and it is called “Pierre de Ronsard,” aka “Eden Rose.”
I probably stared at the page for a very long time, what makes me even more excited was that rose are not only mention in that page but multiple time in the book then I’ve learned that Pierre de Ronsard rose are the most popular rose in the world until today it is still the world famous rose! I remembered after seeing that, I decided no matter what I need to find it. However, after one year I found it but it died from overwater due to my leaking of gardening experiences.
Until now, ten years after, I finally got my chance to see it, touching it, and get my whole nose into the flower to smell it in real life in March this year while I visited the rose festival in Taipei, Taiwan. Funny how I found it available online for me to purchase on the same day, and my little childhood dream came true that day! This is my little story of how I deep dive into the world of roses. It is pretty crazy because it all started with a random visit to the garden center, and my intention was not to buy anything at all. I hope you enjoyed my story. Thank you so much, and visit the garden center to see the rose now. Maybe you will consider bringing one home as well!
Pierre de Ronsard, a big climbing rose only blooms from spring to early summer, bred by Meilland International. It has a deep pink color in the middle with white at the outside ring, and the flower can last at least two weeks, and people sometimes joke that it is a faux rose. It blooms well in the cooler zone experience with a cold winter that the temperate can cause the roses to stop growing or falling leaves. However, it gets tricky to bloom in the warmer zone (somewhere like Florida, Hawaii, etc.) and tropical without a proper winter.
