Travel Stories: Roseraie de L’Hay Les Roses

If you just read the headline of this post and are thinking I’ve started writing in French, my apologies! Roseraie de L’Hay Les Roses is the name of one of the finest rose gardens I’ve ever seen, and it was one of the places we visited during the French tour I led in June.

A little background first…

This garden was created by Jules Gravereaux, who made his fortune from the Bon Marche store. He was a rose collector. He established it in the late 1800s and this was the first garden dedicated solely to the rose. It’s the oldest rose garden and covers almost 4 acres.

There are over 11,000 roses set in 13 collections, and there are 3,000 species and varieties. There is a large collection of old roses. The garden was designed by landscape architect Edouard Andre and Jules Gravereaux’s son, who drew up the plans.

I loved seeing the many different types of supports and structures and, of course, every type of rose imaginable! Visiting a rose garden in June is really the ideal time because the majority of the roses will be blooming their hearts out. So if you’re planning a trip to Roseraie de L’Hay Les Roses — or any other rose garden for that matter — June is when the roses will be at their best.

And now for a few more rose photos from our visit. Remember that you can click on any of them to view a much larger image. If you’re wondering which rose that is on the front arbor in the main photo above, that is ‘Excelsa’. Wow.

 

The roses climbing on the arbors were amazing! Above right: that’s the rose you see in the photo on the left. The cultivar name is Rosa filipes ‘Kiftsgate’.

   

Above left: ‘Polka91’. Above middle and right: my new favorite rose, ‘Pierre de Ronsard’ (from Meilland). In the States, it is sold under the name, ‘Eden’. Are they gorgeous or what?