what reddish looking landscaping flower gives off a scent.

[jam8952]

this maybe a weird question I was wanting to know what reddish looking landscaping flower gives off a sweet scent at a hotel in virginia. here's the story I went up to chester virginia to visit a family member this was about 3 years ago we had stayed at a hotel up there while visiting a family member. when I first stepped out of the car at the hotel I smelled this sweet smell that smelled wonderful the first thing I saw was these reddish looking flowers that the hotel had landscaped so I went over a bent down and smelled the flowers to see if that's what I smelled and it was they were red looking flowers they were giving this sweet smell off. oh by the way when I smelled the sweet smell from the red flowers this was at night I had smelled the smell at night. I have been looking all over the internet trying to find out what kind of red flowers these are but I can not find no information. thanks

[rainbowgardener]

Wow... not nearly enough information. Your best bet would be to call the hotel back and ask them what they have planted.

You didn't say what the plant looked like. Was it a shrub, a low growing ground cover, a bunch of tall stems or what? When you bent down to smell the flowers, how far down were you bending (close to the ground, just a little bit, etc)? How big were the flowers (a bunch of tiny flowers all over or big flowers)? Do you remember anything about what these "reddish" flowers were shaped like (stars, daisies, trumpets, balls etc)? Can we assume that you know what roses look like and would have recognized those?

If you can answer some of these questions, we might be able to make some guesses.

In the meantime I'm going to just throw out a few possibilities of fragrant flowers that come in red varieties. If you type each one in google and specify images, you will find pictures of what they look like to see if you recognize it (e.g. on my list is freesia, type in the search box freesia images to find pictures of them).

Freesia, sweet pea, dianthus (including carnations, pinks, sweet william), peony, stock, phlox, camellia, bird of paradise, and of course roses.

Hope this helps some!

[jam8952]

hi thanks for replying to my question I appreciate it. The reddish looking flowers were growing low to the ground and the reddish flowers were kinda big flowers. I can not really remember what the shape of the flowers were and I don't think they were roses. Like I said this was at night when it was dark so I could not get a full view of what the flower looked like all I know is that it looked like a reddish color and it was kinda low growing to the ground and they were descent sized flowers with a sweet smell. I will however look up your list of flowers you recommended to me below to see if any of them flowers look like it. thanks

[applestar]

One more clue -- what time of the year/month was it?

Also -- by reddish do you mean it was a dark color and not pink or orange, but it could have been maroon or purple?

Any clue about the leaves?

[rainbowgardener]

What you are describing, low growing plant with night blooming incredibly sweetly fragrant flowers keeps making me think of jasmine. However, jasmine only comes in white or yellow flowers and has lots of little star shaped flowers. It does seem like it would be hard to mistake white in the dark for anything else, so probably not, but I thought I'd throw it out there.

Where you are jasmine is probably very common planting and would be blooming now. Stop by some and see if that is the smell you remember!

[jam8952]

hi there again I don't think it is jasmine because I have a jasmine vine growing in my yard. I'm thinking it might be a peony flower because I looked up peony flower and looked up the species buckeye belle peony and it looked similiar to that one does anyone know if the buckeye belle peony flower have a scent or fragrance. thanks

[rainbowgardener]

Peonies were on my list, because some varieties are sweetly fragrant.

However, the buckeye belle variety is described as:

Herbaceous hybrid, introduced by Mains, 1956; semi-double, red, early, approx. 24 - 34" (60 - 85 cm) tall, no fragrance
https://www.theplantexpert.com/peonies/PeonyList.html

There are fragrant red peonies though, e.g.:

Henry Bockstoce
Herbaceous hybrid, introduced by Bockstoce, 1955; double, red, early midseason, approx. 32 - 40" (80 - 105 cm) tall, very fragrant

[luis_pr]

So what was the answer to these questions: name of the hotel, location of the hotel in virginia, month/year when you visited, shape of the leaves?