Roots and Routes

Rosa ‘Perfume Delight’

• Introduced by Star Roses in 1973
• Bred by Herbert C. Swim and O. L. Weeks
• Class: Hybrid Tea
• Deep, vibrant rose-pink
• Intense sweet aroma
• Parentage: [Peace X ((Happiness x Chrysler Imperial) x El Capitan)]

The Perfume Delight rose produces large, classically formed hybrid tea blooms in a rich, deep rose-pink, but its defining feature is its fragrance: an exceptionally powerful, old-fashioned damask rose perfume that fully lives up to the rose’s name.

Its lineage includes several important mid-20th-century hybrid teas. The rose received an All-America Rose Selections award in 1974, recognizing it as one of the outstanding new roses of its year.

Herbert Swim was particularly associated with breeding strongly scented roses and this one was created to be experienced as much through fragrance as through sight. At a time when many modern roses were being bred increasingly for form, color, and exhibition quality, Perfume Delight demonstrated that a modern hybrid tea could combine those qualities with the rich perfume traditionally associated with old garden roses.