A Summer of Roses

Caryn Hibbert

As high summer approaches and the days are warm and long, we can feel midsummer on the horizon. The summer solstice is on the 21st of June, the day when the northern hemisphere is bathed in more sunlight than any other day of the year with the sun highest in the sky. It is the first day of astronomical summer and one for celebration.

Gertrude Jekyll


It is the moment when nature is at its most floriferous and nothing illustrates this better than the rose.

We have planted many roses here at Thyme from Rosa rugosa in the hedgerows around the orchard to ramblers such as Ghislaine de Feligonde, an enchanting peachy, delicate number that graces the farmhouse garden walls. In Meadow Spa we have the magnificent Sally Holmes, delicately fragrant shrub rose, it flowers all summer long with abundant creamy white blooms that sport the occasional dash of pink around the edge of its petals.
It makes another appearance in the Ox Barn terrace garden and is joined there by Rosa James L Austin, a magnificently scented, deep pink rose that astonishes with its generous abundance.


To celebrate everything rosey, discover our English Rose cocktail here, lay your table with our Rosa rugosa tablescape, or book our magnificent English rose bedroom suite.

 

Ghislaine de Feligonde

James L Austin Rose

Rosa rugosa

A Special rose bred by Mike, our gardener at Thyme

Ferdinand Pichard

Present in paintings, poetry and stories for centuries, roses have an immense history. Their decorative cultivation began in China some 5000 years ago, and since we have seen a kaleidoscope of colours, shapes and sizes and uses from medicinal to celebratory, confetti and perfumes.

Rosa Rugosa is a hardy rose, flowering throughout the summer and into autumn and bearing abundant edible hips that resemble cherry tomatoes.

Bring a bit of the outside in, with the Rosa Rugosa table linen.

 

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