The GUILLOT Family has been breeding roses since 1829. The roses can be found under the entries of the individual breeders. The nursery was sold in 2011 to Olivier Mathis.
GUILLOT, Jean-Baptiste (
Guillot père) [b. December 10, 1803, in Grenoble. He married Jeanne Marie Piollet on August 21, 1825. They settled in Lyon, in the Guillotière district in 1829. Jean-Baptiste started in mixed farming, but devoted himself entirely to roses from 1834 on.
'Lamartine' was the first rose Guillot produced. Jean-Baptiste died in Lyon on April 18, 1882.]
GUILLOT, Jean-Baptiste André (son of Guillot père, also known as
Guillot Fils) [b. December 9, 1827, in Grenoble. From the age of 14, he worked in the family business. In 1849, he invented the process of shield-graft budding on dog rose seedlings. He married Catherine Berton in 1850. In 1852, he left his father and created his own firm. He is probably best known for having created the first Hybrid Tea,
'La France', in 1867. He died September 6, 1893.]
GUILLOT, Pierre (son of Guillot Fils) [b. November 13, 1855. Joined the family business in 1884 and took over management of the firm in 1892. Together with his father produced and marketed 16 varieties under the name
Guillot et Fils. In 1913, Pierre was named Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. He married Marie-Louise Compagnon and they had three children, Hélène, Marguerite, and Marc. Pierre died on September 23, 1918. ]
GUILLOT, Marie-Louise (wife of Pierre) [Managed the business from 1918 to 1926 until her son, Marc, came of age. She died on September 9, 1926],
GUILLOT, Marc [b. July 31, 1899. Upon the death of his mother, Marc took over the business in 1926. Marc married Juliette Granjon. When Marc died in 1953, he left behind Juliette and four young sons.]
GUILLOT, Juliette (wife of Marc). [She continued to manage the business until 1972 when Jean-Pierre took over.]
GUILLOT, Jean-Pierre: [took over the family business in 1972.] in collaboration with his brother
GUILLOT Jean-Marc. In 2011, he sold the nursery to Olivier Mathis.
MASSAD Dominique: [great-grandson of Pierre Guillot.]
GUILLOT, (jardinier) [First name unknown. Was a gardener at the chateau d'Anzelles and bred Mme Bravy, which was commercialised by J.-B. Guillot père. His family relationship to the Guillot of La Guillotière is unclear. Possibly a brother of Guillot père ?]
GUILLOT, Laurent (père) [referred to in
Roll Call: The Old Rose Breeder, p. 209:] Business founded in 1837 under the name "Terre-des-Roses"... La Guillotiere, Lyon, France. Not a member of the above Guillot family.
For more information about Roseraies Pierre Guillot see "Suppliers"...
[From
Roses: Old Roses and Species Roses, by Eleonore Cruse, p. 13:] The Guillot Family in France worked with Tea Roses and bred the first Polyantha.
[From Phillips & Rix, The Quest for the Rose, p. 113:] Founded a nursery outside Lyon in 1829, and introduced his first rose, a Hybrid Perpetual called 'Lamartine', in 1842… in 1852 [when his son set up his own nursery he] went into partnership with another breeder, Joseph Schwartz… [he] introduced over eighty new roses, mainly Hybrid Perpetuals and Bourbons, and, in around 1845, 'Mme. Bravy', the lovely pale Tea Rose that had been raised by another Guillot... the son of Guillot (père)] started work in [his father's] nursery at the age of fourteen. Very soon he made the significant discovery that seedling briars (of Eglantines or Dog Roses) made better stocks than cuttings. In 1852 he set up on his own… [his first introduction] was a winner: the Tea, 'Mme. Falcot', in 1858. In 1866 he produced an even more famous rose, 'La France', later considered the first Hybrid Tea, and in 1875 the first dwarf repeat-flowering Polyantha, 'Ma Pâquerette'.
[From Value for Money, by Lt. Col. Ken Grapes, p. 112:] Jean Baptiste [Guillot] first used the seed of briar roses to raise rootstocks -- much better than growing stocks from briar cuttings as had hitherto been the practice... it is not for 'La France' that Guillot is to be commemorated. It is for his introduction of the first Hybrid Polyantha -- the true fore-runner of our modern Floribundas...
Whilst plant hunting in Japan, [Robert] Fortune discovered a small wild rose... now correctly known as Rosa multiflora. Seeds of this rose found their way to Lyon... From these seeds Guillot eventually produced a small bush rose with little double white flowers. It was called Pâquerette... the first of the Polyantha roses...
[From The Graham Stuart Thomas Rose Book, pp. 318-319:] R. multiflora Thunberg About 1860 Jean Sisley of Lyon received from his son in Japan seeds of the wild R. multiflora of Thunberg, a strong climbing Rose with single white flowers, which was quite different from the Chinese Multiflora of gardens, which had pink or crimson double flowers. Guillot, the famous Rose breeder of Lyon, planted some of these Japanese Multifloras in his nursery, and in 1868 saved seeds from them... one of these had large, tinged white flowers with two rows of petals and produced good seeds, which were sown in 1872, and this produced in the second generation the first two Poly-Poms, 'Paquerette' and 'Mignonette'... Both were continuous in their flowering... 'Paquerette' was a pure white, while 'Mignonette' was rosy-pink and white; both combined the characters of multiflora and the 'Dwarf Pink China'
[From The Makers of Heavenly Roses, pp. 11-12: When the Guillot nursery was founded] Lyon had become a centre for rose growing in France... [hybridization in Guillot's time was basically left to Mother Nature, when] the hips were ripe, they were gathered, preferably after an autumn frost, mixed with soil or damp sand and kept in boxes or pots, over which a sheet of glass was placed to keep mice out...
