Cupcake earned its American Rose Society Award of Excellence in 1983, two years after breeder Mark Spies introduced it. The parentage traces through the floribunda Gene Boerner and Gay Princess, producing a miniature that punches above its small stature. The 1.5-inch double flowers are a soft, clear pink with a mild fragrance, and they repeat reliably through the season on glossy gray-green foliage carried on canes armed with fine prickles.

At 1 to 1.5 feet tall with a similar spread, Cupcake is ideal for container work, patio plantings, and the very front of a border where something with presence but not scale is needed. It thrives in fertile, well-drained soil in full sun and benefits from a late-winter prune to remove dead or diseased canes and cut it back by up to a third. Overhead watering encourages disease, so water at the base. Good disease resistance makes it easier to manage than many roses in its class.