[1] Initially, it was named after a theatre piece called La Closerie des Genets by Frédéric Soulié.

It progressively evolved into the Closerie des Lilas because its owner, Bullier, used to plant lilac flowers.

Many artists and intellectuals adopted the habit to spend time there, including Émile Zola, Paul Cézanne, Giuseppe Ungaretti, Oscar Wilde, Charles Baudelaire, James Joyce, Paul Verlaine, André Gide, Pablo Picasso, Amedeo Modigliani, Jean-Paul Sartre, Samuel Beckett, Scott Fitzgerald, Ezra Pound, Sylvia Beach, Gertrude Stein, Alice B. Toklas and Ernest Hemingway.

Between the two world wars, the restaurant modernised, adopted an Art Deco style, and became more expensive.

[2] The literary tradition of the café is upheld by the Prix de la Closerie des Lilas, an annual prize (since 2007) awarded to contemporary women writers who write in the French language.