

It is a wonderful exhibit of food, parades, parties, fireworks, music, and races! The Rose Festival has been the leader in the community to spotlight the valuable aspects of volunteerism, patriotism and environmentalism culture within the rose city. After all these years since 1907, the festival was able to sustain itself and produce award-winning events. The push to make PDX the Summer capital of the world was underway. Once the word got out that Portland was now coined the “City of Roses” it took little time to start the planning for the first Rose Festival, where the message launched a movement to bring more visitors into the Portland area during the summer months. The Rose Festival – Blooms Annually In Portland Here are a few of our favorite pictures from the Rose City’s International Rose Test Garden.

The Portland Rose Society decided to promote 20 miles of rose-covered streets in preparation for the exhibition. Then in 1905, Portland celebrated the Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition. The city became captivated by this cultural, woody perennial flower. Soon you could find them planted all over, along neighborhood streets and bordering the front yard of Portland homes.

The Portland Rose Society was founded from those early beginnings. Portland was a bustling, growing city in 1889 and the wife of Oregonian publisher Henry Pittock (founder of The Oregonian) initiated an invitation to her friends to view her roses in their garden. We think the most reliable source is the evolution of the name from 1889. The diversity of some of the history around where this nickname came from ranges from the story of Episcopal Church attendees visiting for a convention in 1888 to the Portland mayor’s idea of celebrating a rose festival, to even the amazing climate that is so agreeable for this delicate plant.
