I have William R Smith from ARE and I think it is actually Marie Von Houtte. I have heard and seen pictures of the real WRS and it did look wonderful. I looked on the ARE website and they no longer had it listed so look elsewhere.

Z10, I’m glad you got to see the Huntington under overcast skies - last week it would have been impossible in the heat.
I don’t have any of these, but I love Quietness. Glad to see it doing so well in SoPas.

That's so great that you got to the Huntington... be sure to put on your calendar to also go there in April and May next year when everything is in first flush... go often! I'm lucky, having grown up in Pasadena, so going to the Huntington Library was a regular occurrence from childhood. Also be sure to check out Descanso Gardens in La Canada; they have the most amazing collection of camellias. I'm not sure if the Arboretum in Arcadia is still wonderful, but it used to be.

I've grown Quietness for 19 years, and I love it. Mine is own-root, and it's doing as well now as when I got it. Growing in a 15 gallon pot. Souvenir de la Malmaison indeed stays quite small, and I loved it a lot. Unfortunately, I lost it a few years ago and haven't gotten around to replacing it. I used to grow it next to Eugene de Beauharnais, since he was Josephine's son :-D

Lucky ! Hopefully Moses will see this and comment on his favorite rose quietness. I am growing it and I love this rose. But you are in a different zone. I was recently in woodland outside of Sacramento and visited a beautiful garden At their library that had Wisely. It was 11:00 PM So I couldn't see it too well I'd love to see the Huntington Someday.

Strange that this is not showing up

Beautiful roses!

@Z10Socal, I have Perfume Factory and mixed feeling about it. The bloom is very beautiful and fragrant, but BS resistance is poor in my area. Is your last photo a Perfume Factory? The color is very light. Or is it Love Song instead?

Now isnt that funny. Now I can see the comments after I edit my post saying I could not see them 🙄

Sheila z8a Rogue Valley OR So your William does not look like the one at Huntignton? I google the one you mentioned and it does look the same to me.

susan9santabarbara I do wanna go back because I had tea there and it took up most of the day. Maybe we can meet up there sometime next year =)

Ok I'm going to get quietness then and SDM.

SocalSoCal, I have been growing Quietness for about 10 years. It is w wonderful rose. I had to move her a few times and she bounced right back and never got mad at me. She blooms a lot and is super healthy. I will look for a picture

This is my Perfume Factory 2 months ago. Since then it has lost a kot of leaves to BS and hasn’t bloomed much. But its bloom is always at least medium never light color

Love Song on the other hand, is normally a lavender or light purple

there she is

I'm thinking they messed up the label then because online perfume factory does look more like your rose.

So lovely Kristine! Does it last long on the bush?

sylviaww 9a,hot dry Inland SoCal I first went on a saturday and it was way too hot and my doggies were not allowed to come in. So I booked a night at a hotel and the universe conspired with me and the weather

was perfect the next day.

This turtle across the pond saw me looking at the fish and he swam right up to me. I'm guessing some naughty visitors feed him and he thought I was his meal ticket. He was so cute.

Z10SoCal, the rose I was sent by ARE (2017) has creamy blooms that flush a bright cerise pink on the edges. That is different than the photo you took at the Huntington garden I thought.

Ingrid wrote about her beautiful WRS that she no longer had, but had loved that did not have the pink.

So I am thinking I do not have the real one of WRS.

I have never seen the real WRS I don't think.

Here is another of my not William R Smith, z10 Socal.

This rose is different than I was expecting from the Tea ladies book.

Quietness...what can be said about you. Extremely easy to grow. Doesn't make octopus canes. Excellent black spot resistance, but not entirely so...some late season black spot can occur, but it has been of little to no consequence to me. Fast to establish. Blooms as a young plant....no lolly gagging. Responds very well to aged poultry manure applied in fall, dug in a bit or just scattered about the soil above the root zone. Holds its blooms upright, no arching canes, nor nodding necks. Quick to restart new growth after dead heading. Super winter hardy to its tips here. Bloom is high centered since outer petals recurve and relax making Quietness look high in profile. Bloom centers are ht, spiriling at first and try to quarter when fully open. Interesting development. Scent is medium+, not strong, but not just average.

Caveats:

Prune it like you would a hybrid tea, not like a bush/shrub, i.e. left to its own devices...no no, no. Quietness is really a grandiflora, not a shrub. Pruned like a shrub it will produce undersized blooms on thin stems making an interwoven nightmare of a tangled bush.

Alas, Quietness' blooms are not long lived. 4-5 days on the bush upon being opened from first unfurling under ideal weather conditions, then petals drop...3 days to petal drop when temps are above 85°F. That's the sad truth about Quietness which in the balances is far outweighed by its assets.

Quietness is not the best at being weather proof, but even after a heavy rain the bloom will regain its dignity as it dries out. There is no balling up, period. My mature bushes can reach 6' by fall, and all the growth is vertical to 35° from the vertical, making Quietness a very dignified looking bush. Thorn count is moderate to low.

That's about it, pretty much what I have learned about this great rose. Others may have varying assessments. I am blessed to have one favorite rose that I fell upon as an initial reject, and that bush I bought at first was given to a friend...never even trialed in my garden. I eventually relented and am glad I did.

Moses

Sheila it does look like a very different rose than the one I googled. I hope rouge valley rose has the right one. Thanks for sharing pictures of the one you have.

Diane you always have the most gorgeous blooms.

Moses I'm sold on quietness.

Socal,

You will. It takes in the garden very quickly. No wondering when it will get going. It gets going rapidly.

How I wish Tom Carruth concentrated his rose breeding efforts on black spot resistance. I really can't grow anything he has introduced unless faithfully sprayed.

Moses