Introducing ‘Strawberry Hill’ David Austin Rose
I don’t think there is a happier color in the world than pink. Especially the perfect shade of strawberry-pink like that of Austin’s ‘Strawberry Hill’ rose, actually named for Horace Walpole’s Gothic Castle in Twickenham. Introduced in 2006 (Registration name: Ausrimini), ‘Strawberry Hill’ has very full, very large blossoms borne in generous clusters. The scent is strong, the foliage glossy/relatively disease-free and the shrub maintains a height of about 4′. I think, with all the traits David Austin is looking for in his breeding program, he hit the nail on the head with this one. It’s the quintessential “English rose.”
I’d love to simply wax rhapsodic about ‘Strawberry Hill’ but these days all the roses in our garden are being seen through the distorted lens of our midge problem and I fear that will be the case for some seasons to come. This could be a good thing, though, (there I go making lemonade again) because what rose gardener hasn’t had a pest or disease wreak havoc in their garden at some point? The midge might be separating the men from the boys, so to speak. If a rose can survive our midge-laden garden then perhaps it will grow wonders in yours.
At any rate, ‘Strawberry Hill’ put on her best show last June, just before the soil temperatures and the midge went haywire. From there, she valiantly tried to set new growth and buds all summer but unfortunately all new growth was destroyed. I think of all the roses in our garden basically getting there butts handed to them this one was one of the most depressing because I am absolutely in love with this rose. The photos are not doing it justice but the color really is the perfect pink, the size of each blossom is enormous (over 4″ across!), and the scent, to me, is just like those violet candies we ate as kids. Remember?
I don’t know what the future brings for ‘Strawberry Hill’ in our garden, as is the case for all of our remontant roses. One of the problems is the repeat-bloomers are midge magnets and the damage weakens them considerably, ill-preparing them as they head into a very cold winter like the one we just had. Our ‘Strawberry Hill’ made it through, unlike so many others, so I’m hopeful that we’ll have at least one more bloom cycle before a decision is made on what to do with our roses.
If you’re thinking about growing this rose, you might like to try it as an own-root. I found that ‘Strawberry Hill’, just like ‘Jude the Obscure’ (which, incidentally, was one of the roses that did not survive our winter), grew quite quickly whereas the few other own-root Austins we tried never really took off. To read more about this beautiful rose, click HERE.
Ummmm… DROOL!!!! 🙂
Oh, it looks positively good enough to eat! I hope it pulls through and rallies for summertime.
No I never heard about the candies but SH is absolutely stunning but of coarse all of your roses are 😉
What an amazing collection of roses you have! This one is beautiful!
madelief x
Thanks everyone! It really is a beautiful rose. 🙂
I was a student at Stawberry Hill and would love to have this rose. However, I am aiming to make my new garden as bee friendly as possible and wonder how the bees get on with these very dense blooms. Following on from that I would also like to see hips in the Autumn. Advise please.
Hi Michelle, Strawberry Hill does produce hips and I think you’ll be happy to know it’s also one of my most frequently visited roses by the bees. When the blooms open, the stamens are quite prominent. I have photos of these more open blooms in a recent post here. I think you’ll like this rose!
Strawberry Hill is a stunning!
My nearby nursery carry this variety and I am thinking of getting one. I live in zone 5b and worried about the hardiness of strawberry Hill ?
Does the color wash out in the hot summer sun as many Austins?
Thanks
Fadi
Hi Fadi, welcome! I do know what you mean about Austin roses fading in the sun, and in this case, I feel Strawberry Hill is more affected by air temp/humidity and is a deeper pink in the cooler parts of spring. However, that’s just my observation in our own garden. I will say, however, that I prefer the paler version of this flower that I see in summer. It’s a lovely shade of pink, very similar to ‘Celsiana’.
PS Strawberry Hill looks to only be hardy to zone 6…
Beautiful photos, but confusing information, as according to the David Austen website, Strawberry Hill is a short climbing roses up to 3 metres. Since I have just purchased one from the website as a climber, I do hope that your description of 4’ is not accurate and that the David Austen website description is correct. The photos on the website lead me to assume that this rose is indeed a fairly vigorous climber, which it does look to be from the way it is behaving in it’s pot straight from the nursery. ‘Reaching for the skies’ would be a good descriptive term I think. In all other regard it is identical to your photos, a very beautiful rose with healthy looking glossy foliage and currently 2 flowers and with a number of buds ready to break. Your is not the only website where I have heard it described as 4ft, which sounds like a shrub rose. I wonder where the confusion has arisen from.
Your photos, combined with David Austen’s, were the deciding factor in my buying this rose. So I am very grateful for your addition to the online collection of photographic information about it. Perhaps you could check out the height and type of this rose as described by David Austen.
Hi Cecilia, welcome! My understanding is that DA have climbing and shrub versions of many of their roses. That being said, even their shrub roses often throw out very long “octopus canes” that enable the grower to treat that rose as a climber, if they so choose. As for my Strawberry Hill rose, which if I remember correctly was the shrub version, I can only speak to my own experience; In my garden, it stayed around 4′. 🙂