FRITZ NOBIS® – pink historic old garden rose – Kordes
Historic collections and themed plantings benefit from FRITZ NOBIS® as a semi-finished, own-root propagation base that supports premium, specialist container production routes and curated ranges of selected historic roses. This bushy, slightly arching shrub offers dense, grey-green foliage, large once-flowering clusters of pastel pink, semi-double blooms, and a strong, far-scented spicy fragrance that together create a distinctive, short but highly marketable early-summer sales window. The variety’s ornamental, long-lasting orange-red rosehips add a second visual season in autumn, giving growers additional scope for park, hedge and specimen concepts in public-realm and collection projects. Own-root tray material establishes into durable, regenerating plants that underpin homogeneous stands and predictable capacity, well suited to nursery networks supplying thematic rose gardens and show collections, while its defined hardiness profile supports planning for exposed northern and inland UK sites where cold-wind resilience is required in professional projects. As with comparable historic introductions, the development arc runs from root build-up in year one through stronger structural shoot growth in year two to full ornamental value expression and hip display from year three onwards, aligning cleanly with premium 5–7 L container and specialty shrub positioning and helping You schedule reliable, story-rich finished stock for historic rose ranges.
Usage options
Finished-product ideas
- AGM Historic Feature Shrub 7 L – 7 L premium container shrub highlighting AGM status, dense bushy habit and strong spicy fragrance, aimed at specialist retailers and garden centres seeking hero historic SKUs – target audience/channel: retail collectors and heritage-focused outlets
- Pastel Park Hedge Line – 5–7 L bush-trained plants for informal hedges in parks, using the arching, floribunda–shrub structure and robust hardiness profile to frame paths and boundaries – target audience/channel: municipal and public-realm project suppliers
- Rosehip Display Hedge 7 L – container-grown shrubs selected for consistent hip set, marketed for autumn-interest hedges and beds where the orange-red hips provide extended seasonal value – target audience/channel: landscape contractors and estate managers
- Historic Collection Specimen Pot – individually labelled 7 L specimens emphasising origin (Kordes 1940), AGM and strong fragrance for thematic and show gardens requiring documented heritage lines – target audience/channel: botanic gardens, show gardens and collection nurseries
- Pollinator Moment Heritage Bed Pack – batch-synchronised 5 L plants for once-flowering, early-summer beds offering semi-double, pollinator-attractive blooms within wider planting mixes – target audience/channel: integrator systems supplying public and institutional schemes
Technical cultivar profile
| Parameter |
Data |
| Name and registration |
Historic rose from the Historical rose commercial group; current trade name FRITZ NOBIS® – pink historic old garden rose – Kordes; American Rose Society exhibition name Fritz Nobis; unregistered variety with no separate registered name. |
| Origin and breeding |
Bred in Germany by Wilhelm J. H. Kordes II. at W. Kordes’ Söhne from cross ‘Joanna Hill’ × ‘Magnifica’; introduced in 1940 by W. Kordes’ Söhne and positioned today as a historic, old garden shrub–floribunda rose. |
| Awards and recognition |
Holds the RHS Award of Garden Merit (1993), indicating reliable garden performance under UK conditions and providing a recognised quality signal useful for curated heritage ranges and professional assortment building. |
| Growth and structural characteristics |
Bushy shrub, 130–190 cm high and 100–160 cm wide, with slightly arching stems, moderately thorny shoots and dense, slightly glossy grey-green foliage; self-cleaning behaviour not documented in available data sources. |
| Flower morphology |
Semi-double, flat flowers with 13–25 petals, large-sized (approximately 2.75–3.95 in), presented mainly in clusters; not remontant, flowering once to give a concentrated early-summer display suitable for seasonal feature concepts. |
| Colour data and phenology |
Soft pastel pink with a subtle salmon tinge; buds light pink with salmon inside, opening to pale pink with salmon striping, then fading to almost white edges and powder-pink centres; ARS pb, RHS 65D outer, 48D inner; colour retention medium. |
| Fragrance and aroma |
Strong, far-scented fragrance with a distinctly spicy character; scent carries well around plantings, adding sensory value in specimen, park and collection uses where aromatic impact is part of the specification. |
| Hip characteristics |
Produces abundant, spherical orange-red hips 20–30 mm in diameter; hips are notably ornamental and long-lasting into autumn, providing secondary interest and supporting rosehip-focused design and harvest concepts. |
| Resistance and winter hardiness |
Winter hardy to approximately −32 to −29 °C (USDA 4b, RHS H7, Swedish zone 5); moderate overall disease resistance with moderate susceptibility to powdery mildew and black spot, but rust-susceptible; regular plant protection recommended. |
| Horticultural recommendations |
Best used in parks, specimens, hedges, beds and on pergolas; maintenance requirement high due to low disease resistance; bush-trained with discreet support; suited to premium container, specialty product paths, targeting 5–7 L pots. |
FRITZ NOBIS® combines bushy historic shrub character, AGM-backed reliability and ornamental hips with own-root predictability and regeneration, offering a stable basis for long-lived, homogeneous ranges; please contact us to coordinate volumes and scheduling.
