Mark. Gooley wrote:

Foolishly I bought some of those "body bag" roses late
this winter

Yes foolish, not just due to the short roots
but because you have no idea what you are getting
until it blooms. Unless that excites you. In my case,
then I have a living rose I don't know what to do with,
but don't want, such as the two Faux Granadas that look
more like Judy Garland.



Most of the roses I own don't produce flowers that look
like the classic florist's rose, high-centered, relatively
few petals, the whole shtick that one expects to get in a
florist's bouquet of a dozen long-stemmed roses.

It is a matter of personal taste. I love the grace and
form of the classic high-centered hybrid tea rose. It has
beauty and a kind of "restraint" that the big floppy
"antique" and Austin roses do not, and HTs tend to last
longer without looking like garbage, too. On the bush
and in a vase. I only keep roses with poor form (in my
opinion the big floppy ones)because they are so often
fragrant. I am willing to put up with lousy form and
poor substance for fragrance. Speaking of substance, that
is another thing the classic hybrid tea tends to have that the
"old roses" and "nouveau old roses" do not. The petal
thickness tends to be better in hts.

Again--it's all about what you like.