Enter our inaugural Lilac Tour & Contest today!

MANCHESTER, NH – Spring has definitely sprung and along with my tulips and daffodils, I can also see that my lilac bush is starting to green up. Lilacs were the most fragrant flower of my childhood and I loved it when my mom would bring in a bouquet from the garden – the entire house smelled like joy.

Which brings me to this: We are launching an inaugural Ink Link Lilac Tour & Contest. We want those of you who love lilacs and nurture them in your garden to add them to our list which we will map so that people who love lilacs can drive by and see them. But even more than that, we want to decide who has the best lilacs in the city, so there is also a contest.

Winners will receive bragging rights, a lovely frameable certificate and a prize (to be determined).

This idea came from Jen Drociak, who is a reader of the Ink Link, a lifelong city girl and lover of lilacs. She came up with this idea because she knows we need to be reminded of the joy and beauty around us.

In her own narrative words:

Jen Drociak loves lilacs. She especially loves her white lilac which she has maintained for 27 years. In fact, it once wasn’t as beautiful as it is now. Until February of 2009, when two, 50+ foot spruce trees fell in her yard/on her house in a windstorm, the lilac was partially shaded by these trees. The only part of it that did well were the branches growing toward and over the front sidewalk, which was in full sun.

Since it was no longer shaded by the trees, Jen has meticulously maintained it for the past 15 years, pruning and deadheading it each year on a step ladder in the sun. She curses because its annual maintenance is not a fun chore but takes joy that, in return, it rewards her each year with the most magnificent of blooms.

Each year Jen has told her family and friends that she has never seen a more beautiful white lilac in the city of Manchester and has joked that if there was a contest it would be award-winning. In fact, it frequently stops people in their tracks while walking by.

Last year she awarded it a blue ribbon for fun but thought how much more fun it would be to have a city-wide lilac tour and contest, like the annual winter holiday light tour/contest. She has also led her own unofficial lilac walk in her neighborhood for several years and thought why not celebrate our state flower, spring, and the city’s quality of life with something positive, and the thought for a lilac tour/contest was born.

If you’re excited about lilacs and want to participate, click here to enter some basic info about your lilac and why it’s beautiful to you.