As you might guess, the rambler Rosa 'Veilchenblau' was bred in Germany. The name translates as "violet flower blue". In 1909 chief gardener Hermann Kiese bred this charismatic rose and it was sold by nurseryman Johann Christoph Schmidt. The parents are thought to be the mauve Souvenir de Brod AKA Erinnerung an Brod, and Turner's Crimson Rambler, a strong rose with Asian heritage. Veilchenblau is a parent of a number of other purple ramblers bred in the early 1900s.
At one time in the history of horticulture a quest to breed a blue coloured rose was a craze, and why not? I can't think of a more delightful goal to focus one's life energies on, besides having kids, but a really successful rose cultivar will outlast any human life span, so I guess that is a more lasting and unique legacy than parenthood.
The famous Veilchenblau rose is hybrid multiflora cultivar that has been variously described as mauve, violet or blue in colour, but the wonderful thing about it is the radically unstable, unpredictable range of colours seen in the flowers. They can start out fully pure white, or a stunning vibrant magenta purple, when fully open will reveal stripes colour blocks, then and will fade to a rather sad dusty mauve until petals drop and small rose hips form, the whole time attracting aphids, ladybird bugs, bees and myself.
The flowers have a fresh smell but really no scent to speak of, and the multiflora form of this rose looks like a pretty little posy, but it is not much use as a cut flower as the petals drop quickly.
This cultivar is pretty-much free of thorns, but I still recommend wearing hand and arm protection while pruning any rose. Another good trait of this rose is its tolerance of light shade, unlike most roses.
Like most rambler roses, Veilchenblau is non-remontant. That means it has only one flush of flowering in the year, but it is quite a long season from spring into late summer, depending on weather conditions. It is still a beautiful garden plant for a lot of the year, with attractive green bushy foliage leading up to the spring flowering burst. Veilchenblau will look bare and ugly in winter, but so will most other roses too. Repeat-flowering or remontancy is a characteristic that rose breeders have deliberately bred into their new creations to give extra episodes of blooming, but the flowering season of Veilchenblau is so long that I don't regard its lack of remontancy as a flaw. Lots of the oldest heritage rose cultivars and species are non-remontant.
In some sources on the internet you might find Veilchenblau described as a climber but it is not, it is a rambling rose and there are important differences between rambers and climbers. In general climbers do repeat flowering while ramblers just have one flowering burst in the warm part of the year. This means the timing of pruning of the two different types follows different rules. The pruning schedule for ramblers is not as strict as with most rose types. It does not need to be in July or August, just prune when it has finished its flowering season, or whenever you see canes that are dead or getting in your way. I cut out dead, old and unhealthy and inconveniently located canes from the base of the rose with a hand saw or geared pruning tool. With ramblers you do not need to get your head around "breaking apical dominance, training main canes horizontally and pruning lateral shoots" and all that complicated hassle involved in pruning climbing roses. You don't need to worry about Veilchenblau. It will give you flowers in spring, unless you do something seriously harmful to it.
How to prune rambling roses RHS - Royal Horticultural Society
Unlike eastern states Australian cities, Perth has a widespread and serious problem of root-knot nematodes in the soil. They are a harmful type of nematode that can infect soil and plant roots, impairing the vigour of the plant and often eventually killing the plant. not all garden plants are suceptible to this pest, but roses are. This is why good garden plant retailers in Perth only stock roses grafted onto the roots of the Fortuniana rose, which is known for its resistance to root-knot nematode. This is why, for Perth gardeners, trying to grow your own new roses from striking cuttings from your favourite garden roses is not a particularly sensible thing to do, unless you have a Fortuniana root stock plant handy and have the skills to graft a cutting onto it, which I do not. Nevertheless, I have tried growing Veilchenblau from cuttings on its own roots, for three reasons. Firstly, Veilchenblau has been used as a rootstock in some countries so I wanted to see how it might go in my garden, Veilchenblau is easy to strike, and Veilchenblau can tolerate light shade, and I wanted a rose to fill a slightly shady spot. Unfortunately none of those plants have lasted. Anyway, leaving aside Perth's nematode,roots and roses problem, I have found the above-the-graft parts of the Veilchenblau rose to be vigorous, healthy and resistant to diseases.
Despite the many shortcomings of Veilchenblau; little scent, no repeat flowering, no good as cut flower, I would never want to be without it in my garden, just because the flowers are fascinating and beautiful, and the new foliage is also lovely to look at.
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