Coucou, darlings! Here is a fun recipe for you to make this weekend: rose tea.
If your gardens are like mine, the roses are working hard at giving us a grand show. On my 11,000 m2 of land in Bretagne (Brittany), France, I have seventy-three roses and counting. Some of these beauties are vintage varieties with old root stock, thick and robust.
Others, like the rose bushes at the end of this video, were planted this year. While I want to collect unique and French heritage roses, this year’s program was a multi-stage project for a rose garden located on a corner of my property.
From my office window, I can watch the roses gently sway in the wind, and observe the bird feeders in that area. I love the European blue tits, with their brilliant yellow and blue colors, the chickadees, mourning doves, blackbirds, and more that come to visit.
I am giving these new roses time to grow into their space and settle in before I add hardscaping and other plants. I love that I can move quickly between the bushes to care for them, so I probably won’t overplant the area. I love the look of Russian sage and butterfly 🦋 guara and think they’d be an excellent addition to the design for next year.
If you want to see an interview with Sue Cake, my local David Austin grower, and the day she delivered these bare-root beauties back in March, check out that video on my YT channel. Link in bio!
I have done my best to document the changes around the house this summer. There isn’t a single part of the property that is not under renovation – it’s quite the project. I hope to edit some footage to share with you in the next week or two.
For now, I am sipping on my rose tea and wish you a beautiful weekend ahead.
Bisous from Bretagne,
Shannon
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