"I like everything about it," she said of the garden that has a spray of purple magnolia.

The next square over is Szechenyi, grassy and landscaped with purple magnolias and tulip trees.

Llissa Kkayn bent over to sniff a cluster of pink and purple magnolia blossoms, petals blooming at their summer peak.

Purple Magnolia (Magnolia liliiflora)

Lily Magnolia - This flower represents a love of nature, and is Mokuren's namesake.

In 1955, Francis de Vos began to transfer pollen from star magnolia cultivars to lily magnolia (M. lilliflora) cultivars.

Their lily magnolia genes place them in the second group of magnolias, giving them late flowering characteristics, and their star magnolia genes provide mildew resistance and prolific, fragrant flowers.

A friend from Virginia called them tulip magnolias, with a derisive sniff.

I think your friend is calling them tulip magnolias because of the shape the petals form before the flower opens.

Liriodendron tulipifera is called both tulip magnolia and tulip tree.

And the tulip magnolias had only just dropped their great saucerlike blooms; the flagstones were littered with their large pink petals.

Thanks to a mild winter and the wettest February on record, the camellias, tulip magnolias and Bradford pears have all blossomed ahead of schedule.

Other notable design features include saucer and tulip magnolias, brick walkways, and historical cast-iron garden furnishings from the Smithsonian Gardens' Garden Furniture Collection.

Playing to His Strength The setting was made to order for the cameras, outdoors under the blooming tulip magnolias on this spring's warmest day yet, and it played to Mr. Bush's political strength.

Not Quite Magnolia Q. I've been told that the magnolia trees we have in New York City aren't true magnolias, that is, M. grandiflora, but are tulip trees, or tulip magnolias.

But we were home, this was our city, New Orleans, our little land, and there was no snow falling here, only the soft scent of the sweet olive trees, and the tulip magnolias in the old neglected convent garden throwing off their pink petals.

Purple Magnolia (Magnolia liliiflora)