Rochester’s iconic Lilac Festival is happening right now – so what better time to talk about Highland Park!
A Gift That Grew Into Something Greater
Highland Park isn’t just a park — it’s a carefully conceived arboretum, every tree and shrub deliberately chosen and placed. Its origin story begins with two men who quite literally cultivated Rochester’s identity. George Ellwanger and Patrick Barry, owners of the renowned Mount Hope Gardens and Nursery, donated 20 acres of land to the Rochester community in 1888. That gift became Highland Park, one of the first municipal arboretums in the United States.
Their nursery was no modest operation. Ellwanger and Barry introduced flower and fruit cultivation to Western New York and grew their enterprise into the largest nursery of its kind in the country. Their legacy is woven into the city’s very nickname: it was their influence that helped transform Rochester from the “Flour City” — once the nation’s leading flour producer — into the “Flower City.”
Olmsted’s Hand in the Hillside
The terms of the land gift were specific: the city was required to hire a landscape engineer and develop the park into a first-class arboretum. Acting on the recommendation of the Buffalo Parks Commission, Rochester turned to Frederick Law Olmsted — the same landscape architect behind New York City’s Central Park, the grounds of the U.S. Capitol, and the White House grounds.
Olmsted approached Highland Park with characteristic thoughtfulness, working with the natural topography left behind by ancient glacial activity rather than overriding it. The result is a park that feels discovered rather than constructed. His influence on Rochester didn’t stop there — Olmsted also designed Genesee Valley Park, Maplewood Park, and Seneca Park, the last of which is now home to the Seneca Park Zoo.
Johnny Lilacseed and the World’s Lilacs
If Ellwanger, Barry, and Olmsted laid the foundation, it was horticulturist John Dunbar who gave Highland Park its defining character. Beginning in 1892, Dunbar started planting lilacs — eventually earning the affectionate local nickname “Johnny Lilacseed.” His initial collection of 20 varieties included specimens descended from native Balkan Mountain flowers that early colonists had carried across the Atlantic centuries before.
That modest start has bloomed into something remarkable. Today Highland Park holds over 1,200 lilac shrubs representing more than 500 varieties, making it one of the largest lilac collections anywhere in the world.
How the Festival Began
The lilac festival didn’t begin with a committee or a planning meeting. It began with people simply showing up. In 1898, roughly 3,000 visitors spontaneously gathered on a May Sunday to see the lilacs in bloom — an unplanned gathering that revealed just how much the park had captured the community’s imagination. By 1905 the annual tradition had been formalized as “Lilac Sunday,” and in 1908 the first large organized festival drew approximately 25,000 visitors. That spirit of community and celebration has only grown in the more than a century since.
Beyond the Lilacs
As extraordinary as the lilac collection is, it’s only part of what Highland Park offers. The park is also home to a Japanese Maple collection, 35 varieties of sweet-smelling magnolias, 700 varieties of rhododendron, wildflowers, and numerous exotic tree species. Its famous pansy bed features 10,000 plants arranged in an oval floral “carpet” with a brand-new pattern designed each year. The Lamberton Conservatory, added to the park in 1911, rounds out a botanical experience that rewards visitors in every season.
A Castle on the Hill
Hidden within the park is a piece of history that surprises many first-time visitors: an actual castle. Warner Castle was built in 1854 by Horatio Gates Warner — bank president, court judge, and newspaper publisher — and modeled after the ancestral stronghold of the Scottish Clan Douglas. Constructed of locally quarried limestone, it originally sat amidst a 50-acre farm at what was then the very edge of the city. The castle passed through several owners after the Warner family, briefly served as a sanitarium, and gained a sunken garden on its grounds in 1930. Today it houses the Landmark Society of Western New York.
The Pavilion That Once Crowned the Park
At its highest point, Highland Park once featured a three-story circular Children’s Pavilion — an Olmsted inclusion designed to give visitors sweeping panoramic views of the park, the Rochester skyline with Lake Ontario glittering to the north, and the distant Bristol Hills to the south. By 1963, the structure had deteriorated beyond saving and was demolished. But the story may not be over: plans are underway to rebuild it, which would restore one of the park’s most beloved original features and return those views to the public.
Highland Park is a place where a generous gift, visionary design, and generations of horticultural dedication converged into something the city has never stopped celebrating. Every May, when the lilacs bloom, Rochester remembers that.