I first heard the term "flower and willow" while reading Liza Dalby's book Geisha. It's part of karyukai, "flower and willow world", the conventional term for geisha society in Japan. I took a fancy to the phrase and used it to name my first project and give some influence to the site's design. I showed it to the world.

People were interested in the project. I suddenly was inspired to make this a collaborative project. I could do it, why not get some of the best and enthusiastic journallers to do the same? We would be independent entities, working on individual projects, yet helping each other. Refining and improving.

I had to give the project a name, so I picked "Flower and Willow". It was a lovely title, why not use it again? One day, I realized how apt the title was to the project.

All of the journallers participating in the project are women.

Each of us, in our own way, is a geisha.