Roses
We are wild about roses! There's nothing quite like stuffing your nose into a big dewy rose bloom and taking a long sniff! That's why, every spring, we bring in a massive assortment of rose bushes, with both new and tried-and-true varieties alike.
Plan Your Rose Garden
Roses arrive bare-root in mid-to-late February and are usually available as potted roses for purchase in early March. All are sold in pots, rather than bare-root, which protects their roots from breaking and drying out. You can find our best selection of roses in March and early April when our potting process is complete. Our rose buyer carefully selects the best varieties based on color, fragrance, and disease resistance.
Remember, roses are hard to resist, so when they start blooming in late spring, our selection starts to quickly diminish.
Take a sneak peek at our 2026 rose selection!
The lists below represent what was ordered for 2026. If you’d like to check on current availability of a particular rose, please give us a call or stop on by!
2026 Rose Festival Rose: ‘As You Wish’
‘As You Wish’ is the Official Rose of the 2026 Portland Rose Festival and it can only be found at Portland Nursery. An ode to the magic of true love, ‘As You Wish’ offers fragrant clusters of double, coral-blushed, buttercup blooms on a disease-resistant hybrid tea rose.
For every As You Wish rose purchased, Portland Nursery will donate $2 to the Portland Rose Festival Foundation, a 503(c) non-profit.
- Class: Hybrid Tea
- Plant Habit: Medium-tall
- Growth Habit: Upright slightly spreading
- Stem Length: Medium-long
- Foliage Color: Deep glossy green
- Disease Resistance: Very good
- Flower Color: Yellow blushing pink
- Bud Form: Pointed & ovoid
- Flower Form: Spiraled, classically formed & double
- Flower Size: Medium-large, around 3½-5 inch diameter, mostly single
- Petal Count: 30 to 55
- Fragrance: Moderate tea with a touch of spices
- Parentage: The Nora Virginia Rose x Happy Go Lucky
- Hybridizer: Christian Bédard
- Introducer: Weeks Roses
Learn More
Because roses come in a wide range of sizes, shapes, and colors, placing them in classes helps us organize roses that have similar characteristics. The American Rose Society resets classification schemes from time to time, adjusting to new developments in roses.
Learning the lingo will help you when shopping:
- Single: A flower type with few petals, usually 5.
- Semi-double: Fewer petals than double and often ruffled with visible yellow centers.
- Double: A flower type with many petals, often set in spirals.
- Cupped: The outer petals form a cup shape, holding other petals tightly.
- Bud Union (graft): A bulbous spot at the base where stems unite with roots.
- Own-root: Roses grown on their own roots rather than grafted (they will not have a bud union).
- Hardy: Refers to the minimum temperatures a plant can withstand, not a plant’s vigor.
- Disease Resistant: These plants have shown resistance to at least one of the many fungal afflictions that affect roses in Portland, and may perform better in our rainy climate than others. Please note that this term does not mean the plant is “disease proof.”
