Way back in most gardeners' memories, or perhaps their fantasies, is a grandmother's garden. It likely had a picket fence, an enormous old apple tree, a lollygagging lilac or buddleja, and a rose — a big old sticker bush with flowers so fragrant that the lightest breeze would carry their scent across the yard, through the open kitchen window, and into the house. Where are these wonderfully pungent old roses today?

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They're still available, and their popularity is increasing. Most are antique roses — introduced from the 17th to the early 20th centuries — whose voluptuous blooms in shades of pink and apricot to red and white are celebrated as much for their informal exuberance as for their heady perfumes. To grow one in your garden is to establish a living link to yesterday's gardens.

February is the month to discover these dowager empresses of the rose kingdom. In California's mildest climates, bloom starts in late April or May; in colder climates it will begin between late May and July.

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Bench sits under the fragrant sweep of white-flowered 'Mme Plantier', a cold-tolerant climber or shrub. Large pink rose in foreground is 'Beautiful Carpet'; daintier rose to its left is 'Avon'.

Some types put out a grand spring show, then speckle themselves with flowers throughout the season. Others cover themselves with a big flush of flowers just once a year. But even those that flower only annually are handsome out of bloom, and the perfume of their flowers is so marvelous that they deserve a place in your garden.

Use one of these roses to fill a sunny corner. Settle one against a south- or west-facing wall or let it fountain out of the middle of an island bed.

Then some summer day, when you look out the window to see your grandchildren tearing around your backyard and you swing open the kitchen door to holler "Don't fall into that sticker bush," an unmistakable perfume will waft indoors. And it will remind you of the day, so long ago, when you planted that fragrant old rose.