Home to 170 different species and cultivars of rose, the Rose Garden is designed to be a floral feast for the eye with bold plantings of mixed shrub roses.
The Rose Garden was originally designed by the renowned English landscape architect William Nesfield in 1848.
It wasn’t planted with roses until the 1920s, but since then it has blossomed with 25 new rose beds being added in the last five years.
Rosa ‘Port Sunlight’ in Kew’s Rose Garden, Ellen McHale © RBG Kew
Rose Garden, Ellen McHale © RBG Kew
Rose Garden, Ellen McHale © RBG Kew
Rose ‘Crown Princess Margareta’ (Ellen McHale © RBG Kew)
Rosa ‘Crown Princess Margareta’, Ellen McHale © RBG Kew
‘Lady of Shallot’, Rose Garden, Ellen McHale © RBG Kew
Rose Garden at Kew, Ellen McHale © RBG Kew
To see it at its best, head to the Rose Garden in the morning or early evening where the scent lingers along the mowed walkways between the beds.
See if you can spot the bright scarlet Rosa ‘Trumpeter’ or sniff out the Rosa ‘Lady of Shalott’, which is a beautiful apricot colour with a fragrant scent.
Other highlights include the striking Rosa ‘Princess Anne’ with its deep pink petals, and the Rosa ‘Port Sunlight’ which has a strong tea-like smell.
