Mine just opened. Hot night, hot day.............it smells like STAR ANISE! Which, pretty much, is LICORICE! Strong and odd I think someone wrote here and yes, that is it! Quite unique..........the name now makes sense.............

And I DO NOT LIKE THIS ROSE. And I feel guilty. It looks like a wan, washed-out Julia Child and I appreciate the licorice scent I am getting but do not like that. Oh, sigh..........what to DO when you have a plant that somehow is YOUR mistake for falling for catalog rhetoric? It ISN'T "white or near white" it is pale yellow.............it doesn't have anything NEAR, for me, a hybrid tea sort of bloom shape..............the smell is weird and sweet NOT "strong with citrus"............citrus????? Maybe as in citrus BLOSSOM and THAT is being generous..................I actually hate this rose...............but it is healthy, it is strong, it has had not one speck of mildew or blackspot and this year in 6a, with no real winter and a March warmer than MAY, those diseases have been real challenges................I cannot remove a strong plant but I just HATE this rose for preference reasons..............need to pawn it off on someone.................