[2][7][8] Grown in spring for its scented flowers, the large shrub or small tree is widely cultivated and has been naturalized in parts of Europe, Asia, and North America.

[12] The Holy Roman Emperor's ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq, is generally credited with supplying lilac cuttings to the Dutch horticulturist Carolus Clusius about 1562.

[14] Tradescant's source for information on the lilac, and perhaps ultimately for the plants, was Italian naturalist Pietro Andrea Mattioli, as one can tell from a unique copy of Tradescant's plant list in his Lambeth garden, an adjunct of his Musaeum Tradescantianum; it was printed, though probably not published, in 1634: it lists Lilac Matthioli.

That Tradescant's "lilac of Mattioli's" was a white one is shown by Elias Ashmole's manuscript list, Trees found in Mrs Tredescants Ground when it came into my possession (1662):[15] "Syringa alba".

Peter Collinson, F.R.S., wrote to the Pennsylvania gardener and botanist John Bartram, proposing to send him some, and remarked that John Custis of Virginia had a fine "collection", which Ann Leighton interpreted as signifying common and Persian lilacs, in both purple and white, "the entire range of lilacs possible" at the time.

[20] Additional hardiness for Canadian gardens was bred for in a series of S. vulgaris hybrids by Isabella Preston, who introduced many of the later-blooming varieties.

[22] Between 1876 and 1927, the nurseryman Victor Lemoine of Nancy, France, introduced over 153 named cultivars, many of which are considered classics and still in commerce today.

Lemoine's "French lilacs" extended the limited color range to include deeper, more saturated hues, and many of them are double-flowered "sports", with the stamens replaced by extra petals.