Listing last updated on 08 Jul 2020.

Florence,
Italy

Paolo Baroni was the Head Gardener of the Botanical garden dei Simplici in Florence.

[From The Rose Annual, 1981, p. 111] ....it was only in 1873 that chronicles mention the result of a hybridization performed for didactic purposes by Paolo Baroni, Head Gardener of the Florence Botanical Garden. Baroni had succeeded in collecting a few seeds of R. banksiae alba-plena, and obtained three climbing roses with single flowers which gave rise to considerable interest, since up to that time only double varieties of R. banksiae had been introduced in Europe and not the true species. Baroni's seedlings were displayed at the International Horticultural Exposition in Florence in 1874; and according to the Bulletino della Reale Societa Toscana di Orticoltura in 1877, two of them were white, and one yellow.