There is something quintessentially English about roses in June - and they deserve an equally English setting. Tucked away in the northern corner of Oxfordshire, Broughton Castle, near Banbury, provides the perfect backdrop.

It is one of the most unspoilt historic houses in England. Historian Sir Charles Oman called Broughton the "most beautiful castle in all England . . . for sheer loveliness of the combination of water, woods and picturesque buildings."

The crenellated gatehouse, church and moated manor house epitomise England as it was and the honey-coloured Hornton ironstone still glows handsomely in the evening light as it has for centuries.

More recently, Broughton Castle was accorded a five-star rating in Sir Simon Jenkin's 1,000 Best Houses, one of only 20 houses to receive such an honour. But I love the garden, it hugs the house like a velvet glove and it is the sort of place where roses spill over the gravel or tumble over stone walls.

The restrained colour palette, first suggested by American garden designer Lanning Roper in the 1960s, makes all this exuberance very tasteful and easy on the eye however. Roper had a pure vision. He combined blue, yellow, white and silver and relegated pinks, reds and mauves to another border to avoid the candy clash of pink against blue.

The long battlement borders, running along the moat, still reflect Roper's thoughts on colour some 40 years hence, because Lord and Lady Saye still revere his advice and they have stuck to the concept.

Pink Raubritter roses are framed by blue nepeta, dusky sage, aquilegia and purple, blue and white geraniums. Spires rise up, whether it is foxgloves, delphiniums, monkshoods or white verbascums, and they enhance the rural setting adding a touch of wilderness to the garden.

Plants self-seed and flop over paving and topiary. Blowsy Buff Beauty' sits among a swathe of white willow herb and pink foxgloves mingle with pink roses of every shade including the hybrid musk Felicia' and the smaller sprawling Ballerina'.

Pink is often softened by purple and lilac, whether it pansies or alliums, and swathes of silver foliage soften the planting even more.

When you enter the enclosed Ladies Garden, you will probably recall the scene from the film Shakespeare in Love, when the actor Joseph Fiennes tumbles off the balcony into the box-lined borders.

Joseph probably felt at home as he fell. The castle has been owned by the Fiennes family for more than 600 years - and some say that the fine' lady who rode the cock horse to Banbury Cross in the nursery rhyme was really a Fiennes lady.

The box fleur de lys have four mophead pink May trees, Crataegus laevigata Paul's Scarlet' and these mimic the creamy May trees in the hedges beyond the moat.

Heritage, a spice-scented, porcelain-pink cup and saucer rose bred by David Austin,and Gruss an Aachen', a shapely pink with ivory undertones, fill the box beds and the whole garden is entered through an arch festooned by the soft-creamy apricot rambler Goldfinch'.

Yet visitors do not flock to Broughton Castle. Perhaps the subtlety and the aristocratic restraint of this very-English garden, so intimate in scale and slightly frozen in time, is taken for blandness.

But if I could chose one garden seat in rose-strewn June, I would opt for one at Broughton Castle.

The castle is open between 2pm and 5pm, Wednesdays, Sundays and Bank Holiday Mondays until September 12, plus Thursdays in July and August.Admission: Adults garden only £2.50, house and garden, £6.50. Children (5-15) £2.50. Students and seniors £5.50. Family ticket (two adults and up to three children) £15. Teas are available on open days. Groups are welcome - they may book morning coffee, light lunches and afternoon teas. For further information or to make a booking please call 01295 276070.