Cait's Garden

One of my first garden projects in my new home was planting lilac bushes. I knew I wanted a couple of the traditional French lilacs, but for the third lilac, I indulged in a different variety. Shown in the photo above is my Katherine Havemeyer lilac tree. It’s more commonly called a tree than a bush because it maintains a more tree-like form than your traditional lilac bushes. It can reach up to 10 feet tall and wide, and like other lilacs, it can be carefully trimmed as needed to maintain shape. But it still blooms on old wood, so one must be careful about pruning to avoid flower disruption. And what flowers they are! Amazing, giant cones of tightly packed, large, rosey-lilac flowers. They are like traditional lilac flowers on serious steroids. Gorgeous! You have to see them to believe them. And the scent, I think, is even headier than traditional lilacs. Much stronger and spicier.

These days, there are a ton of varieties of lilacs to choose from, in colors as varied as pink, yellow, and white. There are even reblooming shrubs now. (While I like that idea, there’s something to be said for the old school way of thinking…everything to its season.) But space in my yard is limited, so although I’d love one of each variety, I just can’t indulge. Still, I’m glad to have the old standards, and I’m positively thrilled to have the Katherine Havemeyer.