Syringa Species, Peking Tree Lilac

Bloom time is late spring, after the Preston lilacs and a little before the tree lilac (S. reticulata), to which it's closely related. It...Read More has creamy flowers---white with a slight yellowish tinge---and a fragrance that reminds me much more of privet than of French lilac (S. vulgaris).

In comparison to the tree lilac, it's somewhat shorter and smaller, and more reliably multitrunked/suckering.

Its bark varies widely among the 9 accessions at the Arnold Arboretum. Some have a glossy olive or mahogany bark that exfoliates attractively like a paper birch, and others have a matt corky bark. Cultivars have been selected for bark quality.