Every year we delight in selecting Roses that will excite our tried-and-true Rose lovers and entice skeptics to try their hand at these incredibly versatile and (secretly) easy-to-grow shrubs!
There are certain qualities that are non-negotiable when selecting a Rose to stock at our beloved Garden Centers—they must be disease-resistant, they should rebloom, and, increasingly, they must be fragrant. Fragrance was one of the top trends we reported in 2025 and it hasn’t died down, with our customers coming back time and again to celebrate the heady, sweet, spicy, classic fragrance of Roses.
But this year we are excited to share our predictions and trends report for 2026. At our heart, we are Rose fanatics and we love supporting our community here in Rose City, Portland, Vancouver, and beyond, by pairing our fantastic selection with clever new ways to incorporate Roses into your gardens. Here are the ideas and trends that have us eager and excited to add more Roses to our gardens in 2026!
1. Using Roses in Every Landscape Design Style
Think Roses only have a place in traditional or cottage style gardens? Think again! We love using Roses in Bohemian gardens, Modern designs, container plantings, and everything in between!
Roses are a diverse group of plants, from shrub roses with single blooms, to cabbage-style English Roses, to climbers that tower over us. Not only are there multiple forms of Roses, happily, the use-cases for these versatile, hardy plants are even more infinite!
Use Roses in containers to romance entryways and patios.
Containers liberate Roses from the confines of their planting beds and allow them to bring their effortless, flowerful charm into areas where you’re bound to enjoy them more. Planting Roses in containers makes it easy to bring them up close and personal to entryways or entertaining areas. For container-friendly Roses, choose low-maintenance, free-flowering Roses like those from the Drift Series (we adore Apricot Drift and Popcorn Drift!), or for more drama and elegance, plant larger David Austin English Roses like Olivia Rose Austin, Windermere, Roald Dahl.
Roses lend their structure to Bohemian Gardens.
Pair Roses with grasses for an easy-going, effortless Bohemian aesthetic. In Dennis’ 7 Dees Bohemian Landscape Design Guide, Roses act as a shrub layer, providing height and structure in the background or flowering interest in the foreground.
Roses accentuate the Modern Landscape.
Use Roses as accents next to conifers and clean lines for a look that reads cool and modern. Giving Roses space and a position at the end of a neat row of plants allows them to act as an unexpected exclamation point in an otherwise green-drenched, modern landscape.
Celebrate Roses in ever facet of Cottage Gardens.
In a classic cottage gardens, Roses and their fragrant, abundant blooms intermingle with other cutting garden perennials to capture this iconic look. In our Cottage Garden Design Guide, voluptuous, soft petals of Roses pair perfectly with the spikes of Delphiniums, Foxgloves, and Lavender to create a Nostalgic plant palette, and their blooms dance with Hydrangeas and Honeysuckle in our Dreamy colorway.
Let Roses shine in Traditional Landscapes.
Of course, you really can’t go wrong when you plant Roses next to hedges and other classic flowering shrubs for a more traditional aesthetic. If your goal is a tidy, classic Rose garden, our Traditional Landscape Design Guide provides Rose suggestions for two distinct and beautiful color palettes to inspire you when designing your ideal garden.
2. Pink Roses as the New Neutral
Pink is so much more than Barbies and baby girls—it is an incredibly versatile color can be pulled in any direction to create excitement, sophistication, or sentimental charm.
Use pink hues to create a serene, Nostalgic setting when combined with purple and lavender, punch up the fun and create an Uplifting garden by pairing bright pink with corals and oranges, or add pale pink to a white garden to provide a subtle continuum of Chic color.
Nostalgic Plant Palette
The Nostalgic color palette from our Cottage Landscape Style Guide uses classic pink and purple tones to evoke old world charm and easy comfort.
1) Olivia Rose Austin English Shrub Rose (David Austin), 2) All Dressed Up Grandiflora Rose, 3) James Galway English Climbing Rose (David Austin)
Uplifting Plant Palette
Saturate a sunny garden in cheerful, warm sunset tones featuring bright pink, marigold, and coral from the Uplifting color palette from our Mediterranean Landscape Style Guide.
1) Colette Climbing Rose, 2) Martha Stewart Hybrid Tea Rose, 3) Gertrude Jekyll English Shrub Rose (David Austin)
Chic Plant Palette
For an undeniably luxe approach to a white garden, our Chic color palette from our Traditional Landscape Style Guide introduces pale pink and ivory to an otherwise strictly white and green plant palette.
1) Parfuma Earth Angel Floribunda Rose, 2) Francis Meilland Hybrid Tea Rose, 3) The Lady of the Lake English Rambling Rose (David Austin)
3. Climbing Roses for Adding Height in the Garden
Climbing Roses have skyrocketed (get it?) in sales the last few years, and we think it has to do with their extreme versatility when it comes to adding long-blooming, vertical interest to beds, borders, walls, and entryways!
One of the best things about climbing Roses is that they are still shrubs, so even though they grow quite tall, they don’t twine or sucker, and are thus incredibly easy to prune and train to your desired shape. Rose arbors are a natural fit for climbing Roses and they are equally deserving of a place in both Cottage gardens and Traditional gardens, where they help create intentional entryways to front yards, flower gardens, or delineate points of change along pathways.
While we can’t get enough of climbing Roses on arbors (seriously, the more arbors the better!) it’s the slightly more unconventional use of climbing Roses that we are seeing as the trend for 2026.
We love seeing climbing Roses scamper up obelisks to create a tall, narrow focal point in the center or corner of a bed. This look works well in Cottage and Traditional gardens but translates to other aesthetics too—for Mediterranean gardens, instead of using an Italian Cypress or other upright conifer, why not opt for something smothered in flowers?
If you have a West, South, or even East-facing wall on your home or outbuilding like a shed or studio that needs some excitement, you can’t go wrong with a climbing Rose. We suggest using eye hooks and wire to create a supportive framework that will disappear as you tie in your blooming, climbing Rose. Be sure to choose a color that will complement the rest of the garden and bring you a little extra happiness whenever you see it.
Andrea’s Expert Design Tip: “Personally, my favorite thing to do is to grow climbing Roses up into existing trees—I have an heirloom climber that scrambles up a beautiful trellis along a fence and into an old Walnut tree. When it bursts into fragrant bloom in June it’s an absolute dream to behold!”
No matter how your garden is styled or which colors are prominent, we think that our Rose Trends of 2026 should encourage (or enable!) you to include even more long-blooming, low-maintenance, stunning Rose plants to your garden. Visit our Portland garden centers to see our selection in person and talk Roses with our experts!