Finding Peace in the garden

We find comfort in stability and reliability. It is a joy to know that one can rely on a business that one has supported for the last 30 years, to be in the same spot delivering the same quality service without fail. When we decided to replace nearly a third of the rose bushes in the rosarium, it was good to know that we would be able to buy some of the new roses from the same nursery that supplied the original roses for the new rosarium at Towerwater 28 years ago.

The rosarium being restored

As it happens, when I started cleaning out the loft a while back, I came across a bilingual catalogue of the same nursery dating from 1953. We had initially found the catalogue amongst many other things, in the loft when we bought the property in 1991. We decided to keep it with some other historical documents and records we discovered when we began cleaning before undertaking the renovations.

Ashton Nursery as it looks today

S.F Conradie began his nurseries in 1923. In the 1940’s, S.F. Conradie and his son T.V. Conradie together started the nursery called S.F. Conradie & Son, in Ashton. S.F. Conradie & Son later became Ashton Nurseries (Pty) Ltd.

The biographies of S.F. and T.V. Conradie as published in the 1953 catalogue

The catalogue introduces the business as follows, “We are Registered Nurserymen in Fruit Trees, Rose Trees and Vines, also Merchants in Government tested Vegetable Seeds and Flower Seeds”.

The catalogue contains extensive lists of 14 types of fruit trees, each with its own list of cultivars. They had nine vine cultivars and 100 different rose plants. Inside the printed catalogue I found a hand typed list of additions to the roses, fruit trees and vines for 1953.

It was interesting to note that of the 100 different roses, plus the 10 additional on the typed list for 1953, only one rose survived onto the current list. That is Peace, a rose with the following description in the catalogue: “Peace – You can expect some of the most spectacular roses ever seen in your garden. Flowers are delicately coloured in tones of gold, white and apple-blossom. The world’s favourite.”

The previous owner and sons posing next to a rose bush in the front garden

Interesting how the rose growing culture has changed in 68 years. I understand that rose propagators are constantly trying to cultivate stronger, more floriferous, fragrant and disease resistant roses. These roses inevitably become more popular. Although the favourites of 1953 might still be available somewhere, mostly in Europe, it does make better business sense to grow and stock the hardier ones.

The rosebush, possibly "Peace" a favourite prop in photos

In some of the old black and white photographs we found on the loft, were photographs taken of the family in the garden among their roses. The rose bushes were probably bought from Ashton Nursery around 1953. The tall light rose in many of the photographs looks to me like Peace. If one could colourise these photographs I am sure it would turn out to be the Peace rose.

It is warming to support a family business that has been around for the best part of a century. As we planted the Peace rose that we bought from Ashton Nursery this year, we realised that there must have been a Peace rose growing in the Towerwater garden since it first became available to rose growers after the second World War in 1945.

Restoring the rosarium

More posts featuring the rosarium in flower:

A posse ad esse - “from possibility to actuality."

The hundred petaled rose

In Chloris’s footsteps

Roses in October

The Spring Flush of the Rosarium