The Q&A: Michael Marriott, the planet’s foremost authority on roses

A rose by any other name would be just as rich in symbolism, just as ubiquitous in our gardens, and just as fascinating to hear Michael Marriott talk about

But first, a poem:

Roses are red,

Roses are blue,

Roses are white, yellow, apricot too.

No matter their colour,

No matter their hue,

Roses are the most popular and culturally significant flowers in human history.

- Anon. earthworm, circa 2022

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We are a nation – no, a species – obsessed with roses. I’m not just talking about the fact that the rose is synonymous with love and beauty; that sales of rose stems and bouquets skyrocket around Valentine’s day; that nothing says “romance” like rose petals scattered over a plump bedspread; or that “an English rose” is still used (questionably, I might add, for so many reasons) to this day, to describe a fair maiden of Anglo-Saxon descent.

Nor am I simply making reference to the fact that the rose is the emblem of the English rugby team; and of the Labour party (owing to a longstanding link between roses and socialism); and of the two 15th century houses – Lancaster and York – who fought for control of an ununited kingdom during the War of the Roses.

I’m not even merely acknowledging the fact that in classical mythology, the rose was associated with love and lust and the Goddess Aphrodite; or that, conversely, in Christianity it came to symbolise purity and virtue through the Virgin Mary; or that in both sets of beliefs, the rose represents secrecy and confidentiality.

You know what, I’m not even focussing on the fact that the emperors of the Zhou dynasty in Ancient China presided over a library that, by Confucius’ estimation, contained hundreds of books devoted to the rose. Or that it is the state flower in five US states (Iowa, North Dakota, Georgia, New York and Oklahoma, along with the District of Columbia, if you were wondering). 

Unless stated otherwise, all of the photos from here on out depict roses growing in front gardens within a 10-minute walk from my front door

And I don’t need to remind you of the rose’s ubiquity in our gardens. How many do you have in yours? (I have three, a rambler and two shrubs.) The rose is such an integral ingredient in the make-up of our gardens that you could write an entire book about it. Well, let me introduce you to someone who has done just that.

Michael Marriott is a rosarian. And not just any rosarian, but the former chief rosarian at David Austin Roses – one of the most renowned rose-growing specialists anywhere on the planet – where he worked for 35 years. To this day, Michael is recognised as one of the global authorities on roses of all kinds. In his “spare” time, he also happens to be chairman of the Historic Roses group – which exists to celebrate and promote older and rarer varieties than those most often gracing the aisles at our local garden centres – and runs TOD Garden Tours, with his partner… Rosie (I kid you not).

I sat down to talk to Michael a couple of weeks ago, just before the Chelsea Flower Show. We spoke over Zoom, he from his home in rural Shropshire, I from mine in East London, and chatted about the origins of his fascination with roses, the dark art and incredible industry of producing new cultivars, and why everything you thought you knew about rose maintenance is wrong. 

Note to reader: Roses come in many, many shapes, shades and sizes, and are grouped into categories, most of which have strange names like “Hybrid Tea”, “Floribunda” and “Centifolia”. These are frequently referenced below. If you are confused or curious about which is which, check out this explainer from Gardeners’ World.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

What is it about roses that captivated you enough to devote most of your working life to their production and promotion?

I always argue that roses are the most garden worthy of all plants. I repeat this often, but what other plant can potentially give you a beautiful flower, fantastic fragrance, flower for five or six months of the year in this country – and longer in warm climates – and be easy to look after? And the other thing is that they’re fascinating just because they’re such a central part of our culture.

Where did you first discover your love of roses?

I've always been passionate about plants and gardens, ever since I was very small. My grandfather had a farm in Warwickshire, and then my father started working on the farm as well. They were very busy on that. We had a big garden, maybe two acres, and so I basically took it over, from a fairly early age. I suppose by the time I was a teenager I more or less looked after the garden myself, and thoroughly enjoyed that. I’ve always loved the practical side of it, getting my hands dirty and getting stuck in. 

And did that garden contain some especially glorious roses?

My grandparents’ garden had some classically miserable roses. A couple of oval beds with a few red roses scattered about, planted too far apart and with no leaves on because they’d all dropped off because of black spot. So they really didn’t make an impression on me at all. 

After university, I spent five years in the tropics growing rubber, cocoa and oil palm, and when I came back I by chance got a job at a rose and bedding plant nursery in St Albans. That was my first real experience of roses. Though of course they were all Hybrid Teas and Floribundas and probably a few modern climbers – no old roses at all. But on the basis of that, after about 10 or 11 months, I got the job at David Austin, and that’s when I first started getting passionate about roses and realised in fact what wonderful plants they are. 

You joined David Austin Roses at a very opportune time, didn’t you?

About 18 months or so before I joined, the rose ‘Graham Thomas’ had been introduced, and that’s what really made David Austin English Roses famous, not only in the UK but throughout the world. But the nursery was still very small when I started. We only employed, I don’t know, 10 people, including the office staff, and grew maybe a quarter of a million roses. Something like that. So it was a very small nursery. 

The nursery started in ‘69, and it wasn’t until ‘83 that David introduced ‘Graham Thomas’. There was a long gap there where very few people knew about the nursery, and he really struggled like mad. I think there were a couple of times when he was on the point of giving up. 

But after ‘Graham Thomas’ was introduced, the nursery started expanding fairly rapidly – a bit more money started coming in to pay for new sheds and agricultural equipment and things like that. So I joined at exactly the right time. 

Rosa ‘Graham Thomas’ (growing in Badener Rosarium, Austria)

What made ‘Graham Thomas’ such a special, era-defining rose?

I think it was a combination of the colour and the form. People up to then had been totally obsessed by the form of the Hybrid Tea, and the bright colours of the Floribunda. And I suppose people were starting to get a bit bored with Hybrid Teas and Floribundas, because – and I’m exaggerating – but a lot of them ended up looking very similar. They were all about three- or four-foot tall, very upright growth, and with a very similar flower on top, and so the only variation was colour. 

In the second half of the 20th century there were dozens of rose nurseries around and they were growing millions of these roses. And of course, like anything that gets so popular, you start hearing, “Oh no, that’s too common, I want something a bit different.”

David Austin, the person I mean, specialised in that “something a bit different”. Was it coincidence: his passion landing him in the right place at the right time? Or was it just smart business, spotting an emerging trend? 

He was totally single-track minded about his English roses. Nothing else mattered really. Having said that, he loved poetry and reading. He was very interested in biographies, history, and he loved poetry. But he was totally and absolutely dedicated to his English roses. And people used to say, “Oh you’re very good at marketing”, and he would get very cross about that, because he didn’t really market his roses at all. I mean nowadays they are marketed very strongly, and very successfully too, but not in those days.

You mentioned the impact of ‘Graham Thomas’, but David Austin Roses has become hugely successful in large part for introducing popular new cultivars. What set David’s roses above those of other breeders?

I always say, and I strongly believe this, that the main reason that they have become successful is because one of the main characters David looked for in all of his roses before he was willing to introduce them – or the main character he looked for – was charm. He used the word “charm” a lot. One of his seedlings might flower like mad, have a beautiful flower, have no disease, and have a fantastic fragrance, but if it didn’t have that magical character of charm then it wouldn’t be introduced. I think a lot of people recognised that, and that’s why they became so very popular.

And I’m very sad that a lot of plants that are introduced these days lack that character of charm. They’re introduced on the basis of novelty which, for me anyway, has no value at all. Shortness or tallness or double flower or whatever, just for the sake of it, leaves me cold.

I know you personally weren’t involved in the breeding, but to the outsider, that process of creating a new cultivar can seem like a dark art. How much is it a calculated process? And how much is just trial and error? 

It’s a bit of both. It comes from years of experience. So, certain varieties have proved themselves to be really good parents, and so in the greenhouses there will be maybe 50 or 60 parent plants of that one variety. And then there’s others where you might say, “Oh, that looks like an interesting one, let’s see what happens…” 

Trying to find those really super-duper varieties is very difficult. And it’s all done on a huge scale. I mean, something like 150,000-odd crosses a year to produce around 300,000 - 400,000 seeds; you get about 50% germination so that gives you 150,000 seedlings just for the two garden roses that are introduced every year, and maybe a couple of the florist roses as well. So it’s all on a huge scale. But you have to do that to find those wonderful varieties.

And on what timeframe? Because you need to know what a rose will look like in its maturity before you can stick a label on it, don’t you?

It’s about 10 years. But of course the other thing is the sheer practicality of multiplying it up from the initial one seedling to the 20, 30, 40,000 you need for introduction. That takes time. And I believe they’ve extended that 10 years now to even longer. Because one year a rose might look absolutely fantastic, and the next year it’s somehow become susceptible to disease, or a different strain of disease comes along. 

I remember a few times that happened, where we were just about to launch a fantastic new variety, so you’ve got 10,000 plants in the field, and then it just lets itself down very badly and you have to say, “OK, put all that on the tip.” It’s a tough life. And very expensive, because there’s huge amounts of wastage. 

You said that it got to the point in the 80s where Hybrid Teas and Floribundas had fallen out of fashion. How have rose trends changed since then?

The trouble was, roses were planted in monocultures – in beds just of roses. And the colours were very bright. That creates a certain style of garden, and people just got bored of that and wanted something different, which is perfectly understandable. 

Roses are becoming, not as popular as they were, but more popular. And it’s not very many people who want a monoculture rose garden. Nowadays people want to mix them up with other plants, which I think is absolutely superb, because it actually enhances the beauty of the roses and of course it breaks up that monoculture, so it helps them to stay healthier as well. 

We’ve been focusing on new cultivars, but there are of course hundreds, probably thousands of different roses out there, many of which you celebrate and promote through your work with the Historic Roses group. Why is that work important to you?

Well, David Austin has always grown a very wide range of varieties – slightly less so these days, but certainly when I first started I think we grew about 700 or 800 different varieties. And a high proportion of those were old roses. That’s the true old roses: the Gallicas, Damasks, Albas, the Centifolias, and then also the Hybrid Perpetuals and Bourbons and Portlands. And then there’s things like the Hybrid Musks, which are from the early 20th century – he always had a large number of those. 

So, I fell in love not only with the English roses, but with the whole range of other roses as well. And apart from those we also grew Hybrid Teas and Floribundas. And then a large range of climbers and ramblers as well, many of which are very beautiful. Especially the ramblers, I find. So yeah, I had a direct experience with a lot of those old roses, and always loved them. Not to forget the species roses. More and more I love the species roses, actually – the true wild roses. They’re so beautiful, and tough as old boots. 

It’s a bit of a leading question, but I think people often see a rose as one of the most purely ornamental plants in the garden – not one that is grown for its benefits either for wildlife or for us as food. Is it fair to say roses are purely ornamental?

No, it’s not! Well, the very double roses are not attractive to pollinators, but actually even seemingly double ones may not have all that many petals, and the bees, if they think there's something worthwhile, will burrow their way in there. And of course there’s a huge range of single and semi-double roses, where the stamens are very obviously there. 

Some of the species roses especially, you can hear the buzzing from yards away. I absolutely love them. There’s one in particular which is in my garden, and it was in the garden at David Austin’s: polyantha ‘Grandiflora’, which is a rambler with single cream-white flowers, but the bees just go wild for it. 

You’ve just got to choose the right varieties. I’m looking out of my window and I’ve got an arch of one of my very favourite roses, called ‘Adélaïde d'Orléans’, which has been there maybe seven years now. I’ve been thinking for the past two or three years, it’s getting so nice and thick now that there should be a bird nesting in it, and lo and behold, I noticed a wren has got a nest in there, right in the middle of this tangle of stems. It’s a good thicket of rambles that’s good for wildlife.

Rosa ‘Adélaïde d'Orléans’ growing over an arch in Michael’s garden

OK, that’s all fairly convincing. But what about roses’ utility to us humans?

The hips, of course – they can be used for making jams and jellies. During the second world war they were used as a valuable source of vitamin C. Children were sent out to collect hips. And then not so much in this country, but other countries around the world, especially middle-eastern, Persian-type recipes, and in India as well, they use rose water in huge amounts. 

And they’re used very widely pharmaceutically, and in cosmetics. Then of course you’ve got the perfume industry. So in the South of France, Turkey, Morocco, they grow certain roses in huge quantities for the production of rose oil, and that is used very widely. It’s incredibly expensive, but all the best perfumes – things like Chanel No5 – have just a tiny bit of rose oil, but it makes that difference.

OK, so maybe roses are useful as well as beautiful! They do, however, have a rep for being fussy, high-maintenance and highly disease-prone. I know you disagree – tell me about your approach.

Books and articles in magazines go out of their way to make rose care as complicated as possible – it is one of my missions in life to make it as easy as possible, and still get fantastic results. Pruning is made out to be so complicated – outward pointing buds, and a hole in the middle, and at an angle, and all sorts of ridiculous things – so somehow people think that roses are something apart from other plants. But in fact, of course, they’re just plants. And so there’s no reason to treat them differently to anything else. You just need to apply a bit of common sense. 

But the crucial thing is to choose a good variety. There are some absolute dogs of roses which will just get disease at the drop of a hat, and so you ignore those. And if you’ve got one in your garden, dig it up and throw it away. It’s not worth persevering with something which just gets disease all the time. Try and choose varieties that are really tough and reliable. In the 40 years I’ve grown roses, I’ve never sprayed any of them, once, and never felt the need to. 

OK, so we’ve chosen a good variety. Now what?

One of the most important things is preparing the soil. They like plenty of organic matter, so add in a certain amount of organic matter into the hole before planting. Fertilising: a couple of doses a year, in April and then again in June. That’s all. Rose fertiliser, or just general fertiliser is fine. Mulching is very valuable, but then we should mulch our whole garden anyway, not just our roses.

And then pruning. People say it is very difficult, but it’s actually very easy. Don’t take any notice of where the buds are, just literally chop it down to about halfway. And once it’s a few years old, cut out two or three of the old stems to encourage new young growth from the base. And that’s as complicated as it needs to be. When I prune my roses, it takes me no time at all, because I’m certainly not looking for outward facing buds, I’m not looking to prune to a bud, I just think: “Well, that sort of height”, chop chop chop. The timing is important: around Christmas is great, but certainly before the end of February.

And there’s an obsession with growing roses in full sun, isn’t there? But that’s not always entirely necessary…

A lot of roses are incredibly versatile, and actually they’re not too fussy about where you plant them in relation to the sun. In our own garden here, my partner, whose name is Rosie, wanted to plant a rose called ‘Kew Gardens’ under a big old Bramley apple tree. And I said: “Oh no, it’ll be too shady, roses don’t grow well under trees.” And of course she over-ruled me and planted three or four and they’re absolutely superb. They don’t produce as many flowers as if it was in full sun, but still brilliant. So always experiment.

And that’s the great thing about roses, and of course every plant that’s part of your garden, is that they are moveable, so if it’s not right in that position, you can just move it to somewhere where you think it might fare better. I think people should be much more willing to move things around – that’s the fun part. 

I’m not surprised if people are scared to move roses – have you seen all of those vicious looking thorns?

Thorns don’t bother me too much, having worked with them for such a long time. I never wear gloves either. When I first started working with roses in St Albans, my hands were absolutely lacerated. But gradually over the years I’ve learned not to get so scratched. 

You’re a firm believer in organic principles. Playing Devil’s Advocate, why should we not just spray all of our roses with chemicals, to protect them from pests and diseases?

Because it doesn’t do them any good, for one thing. Some sprays actively do harm to roses. And of course, it’s very often very bad for the environment generally. You’ve got to remember, a few aphids in your garden is good! If it wasn’t for pests in your garden, what would the beneficial insects eat? What would the birds eat? They’d starve to death and your garden would be devoid of all of those. So, my basic theory is that I invite everybody into the garden and let them battle it out themselves. You’re never going to win over nature. Nature is much more powerful than you. So let nature do the hard work.

I imagine you and Rosie have a fair few roses in your own garden…

Well we’re both passionate gardeners, but we don’t quite agree how it should be gardened, or the style of planting. So actually we very quickly decided that there should be His and Hers areas. So I have part of the garden, and she has another part. The other person is allowed to advise, but not allowed to do anything in the other person’s section. And there’s quite a contrast between the two.

Mine is not quite wildish, but it’s not high maintenance. So in my area I’ve got one or two hybrids, but mostly they’re species or near-species forms of roses, and it’s all fairly wild and natural, so it doesn’t actually take a lot of maintenance. And a big section of mine – what I'm looking out to now – used to be a regularly cut lawn, but is now a meadow, and it’s just getting better and better every year. It’s absolutely wonderful. I noticed this morning the common spotted orchids are just starting to come up. Also there’s lots of ant hills in there, and I absolutely love ant hills. 

But in Rosie’s part of the garden there are quite a few English roses. I’m very happy to have them in there so I can walk around and admire them.

And of course you’ve recently released a book, ‘RHS Roses: An Inspirational Guide to Choosing and Growing the Best Roses’. What can readers expect from the book? And what do you hope that people will take away from it?

The main part of my book is my recommendations for the best varieties to plant in various locations around the garden. For example, for the front, middle or back of a border; for mixing up with other plants; for wildlife; for fragrance; climbers for walls or fences or for growing up into trees. In fact, everywhere where you might think of planting a rose. The varieties are chosen on the basis of being really good reliable plants as well as being beautiful.

It also includes a section giving the reader inspiration for all the different ways they can be planted in the garden and how to grow them, with the emphasis on making it simple and debunking a lot of the myths of rose-growing that makes it so off-putting to many. Finally, there’s a section on the history of the rose.

Hopefully readers will come away with great enthusiasm to plant more roses in their garden and realise what incredibly garden worthy plants they are.

Michael’s book, published by Dorling Kindersley, is out now in hardback. You can find out more about Michael’s work and his TOD Garden Tours on his website, and follow him on Instagram here. To learn more about the Historic Roses group, visit their website.

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Do you have any burning rose-related questions for Michael? If so, leave a comment below! Try to provide as much specific information as you can, if making reference to a particular cultivar or spot in your garden.