Article (newsletter)  (Nov 2012)  Page(s) 22.  Includes photo(s).
 
“Old Town Novato” (2009, Pacific Rose Society Rose Show) “Old Town Novato” was discovered in 2003 by Cass Bernstein about a block from the old train station in Novato, California. The original plant no longer exists. The rose grows to five to seven feet tall, with tall canes that arch over with the blooms and maintains a healthy armature and medium green matte foliage. The plant will sucker on its own roots. The plant needs to be well fed, and to have spent blooms deadheaded. The color and form of the plant seem to be highly weather sensitive with the colors used to describe the plant ranging from fuchsia, magenta, deep pink, carmine red, lilac rose and purple crimson. The reverse of the petals can be a silvery pink. While the coastal version of the plant features blooms in a cupped, quartered form, the inland version can present a button eye....The rose is thought to be nearly identical to other “found” roses including “Redwood Union Cemetery HP” and “Jay’s Hudson Perpetual.” For the first few years the plant was thought to be ‘Ardoisee de Lyon,’ but subsequent consideration did not Old Town Novato 22 favor that identification.

Website/Catalog  (2005)  Page(s) 7.  
 
“Old Town Novato” (Found, Cass Bernstein, Parentage, Introducer, & Date Unknown) Very fragrant fuchsia-pink blooms open to a variable form . . . now with a button eye . . . now with the look of a peony. Incurving petals display a distinctive silver-pink reverse, which gives the bloom extra depth. Color and fragrance are reminiscent of ‘Mme. Isaac Pereire,’ but there is an enormous difference! The plant under these blooms offers FAR better disease resistance than that well-known Bourbon, making it a far superior garden rose.