PlantFiles: Common Lilac, French Lilac
Syringa vulgaris 'Primrose'

This plant was purchased at Kmart about 4 or 5 years ago from in a box from a display case of mixed boxed plants. I didn't have much faith in the color being yellow but love to have a bit of fun. I planted it in a pot like my other 2 lilacs which I have had for many years. This year the so called yellow lilac is about 3 feet tall and very full and shaped nice. Lucky me that I have a fetish for cream colored flowers as to be honest saying yellow is a stretch. BUT this is an adorable plant, leaves smaller and more elliptic shaped than my other lilacs and the blossoms about one fifth of the size. It gets covered with small cone shaped flowers in a creamy white with a similar but not as pungent fragrance and I just love it ! It did bloom the first year after planting. Too bad they are misleading in advertising about the color, but I can see how it makes them sell more plants than if it said creamy white. I have grown to love this little plants that has given so much to me in a container and acts as a wonderful backdrop to other planters on my deck throughout the summer. I have no place to enjoy lilacs up close and so I have planted 3 of them in pots on my deck, my largest without the pot measures about 5 feet tall and all three bloom each spring, the yellow blooming last and it is in bloom now, June 5th 2011.

The one specimen of this I have seen (in an arboretum) did not appear yellow at all to me, but rather a pale creamy white. I could not detect any fragrance.

This is perhaps the most well known of the 'yellow' lilacs. The flowers are in fact a pastel primrose-yellow, certainly not bright. However, it is a welcome colour among a group of shrubs that are primarily pinks, purples and blues. It still has the classic lilac fragrance.