‘La France’
Hybrid Tea roses were introduced by crossing the tender, ever-blooming Tea roses with the hardier Hybrid Perpetuals to produce a range of hardy, free-flowering garden plants. The first recognised Hybrid Tea was a chance seedling called ‘La France’, introduced in 1867.
Their superiority was immediately obvious, especially when their colour range was extended early in the 1900s to include yellow and orange shades as well as white, pink and red. They remain enormously popular today.
The Hybrid Teas were the first perpetual-flowering roses that were grown primarily as garden plants. They were grown in large quantities, with 50 or 100 of the same variety to a bed, as alternatives to bedding plants. They revolutionised garden design and laid the foundation for the great popularity which roses enjoy today.