Strolling through the display garden at Rosarium Garden Center on a frosty but sunny January morning, Becca Schmidlkofer talks about the center's namesake plant with admiration. And she wants to dispel some bad PR these fragrant flowers have endured.
"They are really hardy plants that want to grow... They're really not intimidating," she says.
Becca and her husband, Ryan, are the third owners in charge of tending to the gardens at the Rosarium, purchasing the garden center and on-site house in the fall of 2024.
"What the Rosarium has become known for is expert gardening advice... from landscape architects to master gardeners and experts at companion planting, those kinds of things," Becca says. "That's what keeps people coming back."
With some basic knowledge of pruning and planting — including how to situate a rose — Becca says these storied flowers can fill a garden with scent and showers of blooms for many years.
The "own root" roses offered at Rosarium differ from grafted roses in that the whole entire plant, including the rootstock, is one variety. Instead of fall pruning, own-root roses can stand tall throughout the winter, providing rose hips and delicate perches for visiting birds while creating an interesting and livelier winterscape. The roses then just need a clean up in the early spring to take off. In the event of a late freeze, they can cut back to the ground for a fresh start.
"It feels unethical to sell a rose that's meant for a different climate, because it's not going to perform well, and customers want roses that perform well for years and years," Becca says, adding that roses can have a lifespan of 20 to 30 years.
"I think a lot of that stigma in this area [regarding roses] is from grafted roses, when some of the — not neglect, but maybe incorrect care — over the winter kind of results in an angrier [plant]," Ryan says.
Among other varieties, the center offers David Austin English roses, known for their old-fashioned fluffy blooms and often intense fragrance.
All the bare root roses will get started in the greenhouses, with plants ready for preorder and purchase in the spring; weather permitting, the center will open April 1.
And while roses are a specialty, Becca emphasizes that the Rosarium is a full-service garden center, offering shrubs, perennials and some annuals. "And this year, we're really excited. We're getting a curated selection of trees that are especially hardy in the Inland Northwest," Becca says.
Grounds Keeping
Aside from tending new plants that are ready for sale, the Schmidlkofers nurture multiple onsite display gardens that showcase mature and established plants. One of the oldest areas is, of course, devoted to a collection of mature roses. Last year's "cottage garden" featured plants that could be used for dyes. There's an area adjacent to a line of poplar trees that the couple will devote to drought-tolerant and native plants. And one of the more spectacular features is the archway dripping the brilliant yellow blossoms of laburnum, a plant also known as golden chain, each year in May. It's part of what Becca calls a "very small venue that we're starting." The space is available for weddings or other celebrations. "Because we don't have a lot of the infrastructure that a lot of the larger venues do, we don't charge as much. So for brides or anyone who likes to really make it their own, it's a good option for that."
In the fall, Rosarium hosts an immensely popular dahlia festival featuring displays, classes and food trucks that attracted more than 4,000 visitors in 2024. While they do grow some of the dahlias that are showcased, Becca says the festival is an important way to connect with other growers. "There's a lot of people that have really great small farms that we love to support."
Though both Becca and Ryan grew up south of Spokane and became friends in eighth grade, each ended up moving to Bellingham, where they went to college. After college, Becca began working as a teacher and Ryan started out in retail management. They ended up moving back to Spokane, and the opportunity to own the garden center was too good to pass up. As the daughter of a landscape architect, Becca says, "I grew up from before I can remember just out in the gardens working. It's just one of those things that I take for granted, but it's just been a part of me."
One of Ryan's earliest jobs was in landscaping, and he'll focus on the management of the greenhouses at the center, though he notes that as a family business, "We've had to dive in head first so quickly and into so many different things."
When they first arrived on the property, they set their toddler down. "She just took off," Ryan says. "[She had] no fear and just ran through all of the paths."
Becca finishes, "So that's our center, you know, the joy of it all. For us and for her. People get a lot of joy out of getting outside and in the dirt."
