Arthur Bell is a classic Floribunda rose that has delighted gardeners for decades with its vibrant golden-yellow blooms and exceptional garden performance. This hardy and reliable variety produces abundant clusters of bright, cheerful flowers that maintain their colour beautifully throughout the season. Named after a distinguished Scottish whisky distiller, this rose combines old-fashioned charm with modern disease resistance, making it an ideal choice for both traditional and contemporary garden settings.
Flower Characteristics
Medium-sized, semi-double blooms measuring 6-8cm across
Brilliant golden-yellow colour that deepens with age
Light, sweet fragrance with citrus undertones
Flowers produced in generous clusters of 5-10 blooms
Excellent repeat flowering from early summer to first frost
Good cut flower with reasonable vase life
Plant Habit
Vigorous, upright growth reaching 90-120cm in height
Spread of approximately 60-75cm
Strong, thorny stems with good branching
Mid-green, semi-glossy foliage
Excellent cold hardiness and weather tolerance
Good natural disease resistance
Ideal Location
Full sun for best flower colour and production (minimum 6 hours daily)
Well-ventilated position to prevent fungal issues
Tolerates partial shade but may produce fewer flowers
Suitable for mixed borders, rose beds, and informal hedging
Excellent choice for exposed or windy locations
Soil Requirements
Well-drained, fertile soil with good structure
pH range of 6.0-7.5 (slightly acidic to mildly alkaline)
Tolerates a wide range of soil types including clay
Benefits from organic matter incorporation
Avoid persistently wet or very dry conditions
Planting Guidelines
Plant bare root roses between November and March
Container-grown plants can be planted year-round (avoid frozen ground)
Prepare planting hole 60cm wide and 45cm deep
Incorporate well-rotted compost or aged manure
Position graft union at soil level in most climates
Space plants 60-75cm apart for good air circulation
Ongoing Maintenance
Water deeply once weekly during dry periods
Apply balanced rose fertiliser in early spring
Follow up with liquid feed every 4-6 weeks during growing season
Mulch annually with organic matter to retain moisture
Deadhead regularly to promote continuous flowering
Prune in late winter to remove dead, diseased, and weak growth
Spring: Produces strong new shoots with fresh foliage and developing flower buds as temperatures warm.
Early Summer: First major flush of golden blooms appears, creating spectacular displays that attract beneficial insects.
Mid to Late Summer: Continues flowering reliably with successive flushes, though individual blooms may be smaller in extreme heat.
Autumn: Often produces some of the finest blooms as cooler temperatures return, with flowers lasting longer on the plant.
Winter: Enters dormancy naturally; time for major pruning and soil improvement around the plant.
Arthur Bell's bright golden colour makes it an excellent choice for creating sunny, cheerful garden displays. Plant in groups for maximum visual impact, or use as a colourful backdrop for perennial borders. Its vigorous nature and thorny growth make it suitable for informal hedging, whilst the reliable flowering habit ensures continuous interest throughout the growing season. The bright yellow blooms complement purple and blue flowers beautifully, and provide a stunning contrast when planted with deep red roses.
Introduced in 1965 by McGredy Roses, Arthur Bell quickly became a garden favourite and remains popular today. Named after Arthur Bell, the founder of Bell's Whisky, this rose represents the golden age of Floribunda breeding when breeders focused on creating varieties that combined beauty with exceptional garden performance and reliability.
Arthur Bell pairs wonderfully with purple-flowered perennials such as lavender, catmint, and salvias. The golden-yellow blooms also complement blue delphiniums and campanulas for a classic cottage garden look. For year-round structure, consider underplanting with spring bulbs like purple crocuses or blue muscari, which will provide early colour before the roses begin their display.
Prune Arthur Bell in late February or early March, removing approximately one-third of the previous year's growth. Cut back to outward-facing buds to encourage an open, well-ventilated plant structure. Remove any weak, crossing, or damaged stems entirely. In areas with harsh winters, provide protection with mulch around the base, though this variety generally shows good cold tolerance.
If flower production decreases, ensure the plant receives adequate sunlight and nutrients. Yellow foliage may indicate overwatering or poor drainage, whilst black spot can occur in humid conditions with poor air circulation. Regular feeding and proper spacing help prevent most problems, making Arthur Bell one of the more trouble-free roses for everyday gardeners.
Arthur Bell continues to prove that sometimes the classic varieties truly are the best, offering decades of reliable performance with minimal fuss whilst providing the bright, cheerful colour that makes roses such beloved garden plants.
Reasons to Buy Roses from Jacksons Nurseries
(1) ‘Excellent’ on Trustpilot
Buy with confidence from the only online rose grower rated ‘Excellent’ 4.9* on Trustpilot. We have been a trusted supplier of roses for 3 generations. We take pride in growing our own roses in the field before potting them up, allowing for meticulous quality control to sale.

(2) Best Prices Guaranteed – Direct from the Grower
Save £££s by buying direct from a grower you can trust. We’ve already price checked all of our roses against competitors so you don’t have to. We are so confident we offer the best value, if you find a rose of the same type and grade elsewhere, we’ll beat it by 10%.

(3) 12 Month Plants Guarantee
We offer a 12 month guarantee on every plant that you buy from us that we have classified as Fully Hardy. If a plant you've bought from us fails in the first year, we will either replace it or refund you. See our satisfaction guarantee page for more details and conditions.

(4) Third generation family-owned nursery specialising in roses
Jackson’s Nurseries is a 3rd generation family owned business which has been growing roses for over 60 years. Roses have always been our specialty, as you can see from the colourful array of blooms in the background to the old family photo below. Today, we offer over 200 different varieties of floribundas, hybrid teas, patio, shrub and David Austin roses. Our roses are initially grown in the field before being potted up for website dispatch.

(5) Grown at altitude to produce strong, healthy plants
Our North Staffordshire nursery is situated at 250 metres above sea level, producing strong, hardy plants that will thrive in your garden. Our nursery sits on clay, so you can be sure our roses can handle heavy soil too.

(6) Help & Advice and Aftercare
We are help to help you with any help and advice you need in choosing, planting and growing your roses before, during and after your purchase from us. The help and advice section of our website has extensive information, see below some examples of articles you may find useful:

How our roses are supplied through the seasons
All our roses are cultivated in an open field and are carefully dug up when the weather is optimal, typically in October or November. While other nurseries supply roses bare root, once our field-grown roses have been potted up we supply them freshly potted. This better protects the roots and helps keep them moist in transit, ensuring your roses arrive as healthy as when they left our nursery. So don’t be alarmed if the compost comes away from the roots when you remove them from the pot.

The roses can remain in their pots over the winter, as long as they are properly watered and fed, but it's best to plant them out as soon as possible. If you do plant them straight away make sure the planting mix is prepared first, hold the root close to the top of the hole as you tip the pot upside down and try to keep as much compost as possible from falling away. They will already be pruned, so no additional pruning is needed except for trimming any dead tips. Regular pruning can start in late winter, the year after planting.

Rose Types
Hybrid Tea Roses (HT)
Hybrid Tea roses are probably the most popular group of roses, available in both bush and standard form they have long flower stems and shapely blooms. Blooms are typically medium to large in size, with many petals which form a distinct central cone.
Floribunda Roses (FL)
Floribunda roses bears its flowers in clusters or trusses, with several blooms open at time in each truss. A popular choice the Floribunda rose group is unrivalled for colour, reliability and longevity as a bedding display however the flower form in generally inferior to the Hybrid Tea.
Patio Roses (PATIO)
Patio roses were introduced in the 1980’s and the group now contains several popular varieties. Generally low-growing roses that were once grouped with the Floribuna group but have now been put in their own group of compact versions. Usually growing about 50cm high they make excellent plants for patio containers or at the front of borders.
Climbing Roses (CLM)
Climbing roses as the name suggests are the perfect choice for covering a wall or screen. Often grouped together with Ramblers, Climbers tend to have stiffer stems, larger flowers but smaller trusses than Ramblers.
Rambling Roses (RAM)
Rambling roses are often grouped with Climbing Roses but the ramblers tend to have a more pliable stems that can be used to run along the soil to use as groundcover or can be used to make weeping standards.
Miniature Roses (MINI)
Miniature roses have increased in popularity in recent years due to their versatility, even grown indoors as temporary pot plants that grow to a maximum height of 40cm. An ideal choice for planting in tubs, edging beds and rockeries.
English Roses (ENG)
Often referred to as Austin or David Austin Roses, English roses are hybrids of old English roses and more modern varieties bread by David Austin to provide the best of both, mixing old rose shapes and scents with more modern colour range, compact habits and repeat flowering.

Planting Advice
Roses like a generous root space, so dig a deep hole approximately twice as wide as the current root system, preferably adding composted organic matter to the soil. Never plant into frozen soil – in winter, await a frost-free period. Carefully remove the pot and gently tease the roots apart to spread them around the hole. Position the plant so that the ‘bud point’ (the place where the shoots emerge from, where the cultivated rose was grafted onto the rootstock) is at soil level. Replace the soil, firming it down gently, then water copiously. Ideally, a general purpose fertiliser should be applied to the surrounding soil as a top dressing. We also highly recommend the use of Rose Rootgrow, which provides a friendly fungus that prevents ‘rose replant syndrome’.

Buying our Roses
Most of our roses are supplied in a 4 litre pot although this may vary slightly depending on rose variety. If the size of pot differes significatly from 4 litres then we will make this clear somewhere on the product page.
Seasonality
Our roses are grown outdoors and as such are subject to seasonal changes. As we sell potted stock throughout the year your rose may not arrive and look like you expect it to. If you are uncertain how your rose will arrive (especially if buying for a gift) then we suggest you contact us prior to making a purchase.
Freshly Potted
Each year a new batch of roses is potted up ready for the following season. Once potted (usually November/December time) they go on sale as 'Freshly Potted'. If you purchase a freshly potted rose and plant it soon after you will find that when removing the rose from the pot there will be a lot of loose soil as the roots will not have had time to grow and bind the compost.

Pruned/Cut Back
In autumn the majority of our roses have finished flowering and begin to look untidy, at this point we prune them quite hard in preparation for the following season. We continue to sell roses throughout the year, when a rose has been pruned in such a way we will identify it has being so. If you are not sure what to expect then please ask prior to making a purchase. Some garden centres/supermarkets sell stock that has been grown abroad or in poly-tunnels so they look 'picture perfect' out of season, while this is ideal for a gift they are short lived once planted.

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