# Shōjo Manga (Japanese Girls' Comics)

> The look of Japan's girls' comics (strictly a readership, not a style), which Takahashi Macoto fixed in 1958 from the lyrical illustration (jojōga) of Nakahara Jun'ichi and the Year 24 Group remade in the 1970s. The page is built for feeling, not action: panels overlap, slant or lose their borders, and slender full-length figures with huge, sparkling eyes merge with flowers, petals and pattern screentone into one layered spread, while inner monologue drifts free of the balloons through white space. Black and white inside; soft colour on covers and title pages.

- Period: 1958–present
- Where: East Asia, Global / networked
- Origin: Japan, in the girls' magazines of the Tokyo publishers. Tezuka Osamu's Ribon no Kishi (Princess Knight, 1953–1956) brought story manga to girls' magazines, but in a dynamic style shared with boys' manga. A separate, lyrical look came from Takahashi Macoto (1934–2024), born in Osaka, who had illustrated rental books (kashihon) since 1953 and took up lyrical illustration (jojōga) after finding the work of Nakahara Jun'ichi (1913–1983) in the magazine Himawari, and was influenced too by the Takarazuka Revue. His ballet story Arashi o Koete (Beyond the Storm), in Kōbunsha's Shōjo from January 1958, fixed it, and Maki Miyako carried it into the mainstream girls' magazines at the end of the 1950s. In the 1970s women artists later called the Year 24 Group (after Shōwa 24, 1949; at its narrowest Hagio Moto, Ōshima Yumiko and Takemiya Keiko) remade the page; Hagio and Takemiya shared the Ōizumi Salon, a rented house in Nerima, Tokyo, in 1971–1973. Their work ran in Shogakukan's Shūkan and Bessatsu Shōjo Comic, Shueisha's Margaret and Ribon and Hakusensha's LaLa and Hana to Yume. Shōjo manga names a readership rather than a style: girls' comics also ran short humorous stories (their earliest form), Tezuka-style adventure and, after the girls' kashihon anthology Kaidan (Ghost Stories, from 1958) succeeded, horror such as Umezu Kazuo's Reptilia (Shōjo Friend, 1965), and the Year 24 Group's open panels and detailed eyes later spread to shōnen manga; this entry describes the lyrical, decorative idiom
- Branch: Pictorial & machine age
- Also known as: Shōjo manga (少女漫画), Girls' manga, Girls' comics, Year 24 Group style (its 1970s strand; 花の24年組, Hana no 24-nen gumi)
- Page: https://stylogeny.com/styles/shojo-manga/

## Use it with care

Shōjo manga is the living work of named, mostly women artists, several of them still publishing, and its series and characters, from The Rose of Versailles to Sailor Moon, are in copyright: draw original characters in the shared idiom, never ask an image model for a named series, character or artist's hand, and label generated pages as AI-made rather than presenting them as a manga artist's work. Many heroines, and the boys of the 1970s boarding-school romances, are adolescents: keep the romance in mood, flowers and faces, and never sexualise characters who read as minors.

## How it works

- Compose each page for feeling rather than action: overlap and slant the panels, drop their borders, and superimpose figure, background and words into one non-narrative composition across the spread; slow the sequence down and leave white space for the pauses instead of cutting between ruled boxes like a film.
- Draw characters slender and full-length, freed from the panels to show a whole outfit, and give them very large eyes with long lashes and many catchlights, with dots, stars or several colours in the iris, larger for girls than for boys; draw young men as slender, androgynous beauties (bishōnen) with the same care as the heroines; move to a big close-up of the face when the emotion peaks.
- Set the mood with decoration that stands for feeling, not place: roses and other flowers crowding behind a figure, drifting petals, ribbons, frills, fluttering dresses and sparkling light, drawn by hand or laid in from pattern screentones of flowers and glitter.
- Take the inner monologue out of the balloons and scatter it across the page in loose lines beside the vertical dialogue, so that words drift over the picture.
- Draw in fine pen line for a black-and-white magazine page, with grey and texture from screentone; keep colour, soft and painted, for covers, title pages and the paper goods given away with the magazine.

## Its design choices

Defining choices make the style, characteristic ones are usual, occasional ones turn up now and then.

### Layout & composition
- [Collage & layering](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/collage-and-layering/) (defining)
- [Broken grid](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/broken-grid/) (defining)
- [Organic flow](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/organic-flow/) (characteristic)
- [Framed panels](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/framed-panels/) (characteristic)
- [Diagonal axis](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/diagonal-axis/) (occasional)
- [Full bleed](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/full-bleed/) (occasional)

### Space & hierarchy
- [Sequential narrative](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/sequential-narrative/) (defining)
- [Generous white space](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/generous-white-space/) (characteristic)
- [Layered information](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/layered-information/) (characteristic)
- [Single focal point](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/single-focal-point/) (characteristic)
- [Extreme scale contrast](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/extreme-scale-contrast/) (occasional)

### Typography
- [Rotated & vertical setting](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/rotated-and-vertical-setting/) (defining)
- [Hand-lettering](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/hand-lettering/) (characteristic)
- [Eclectic mixing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/eclectic-mixing/) (occasional)

### Colour
- [Monochrome](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/monochrome/) (defining)
- [Light ground](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/light-ground/) (characteristic)
- [Pastel](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pastel/) (characteristic)
- [Gradients](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/gradients/) (occasional)

### Form & shape
- [Stylised figuration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/stylised-figuration/) (defining)
- [Distortion & exaggeration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/distortion-and-exaggeration/) (characteristic)
- [Biomorphic curves](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/biomorphic-curves/) (characteristic)
- [Naturalistic depiction](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/naturalistic-depiction/) (occasional)

### Surface & texture
- [Halftone & Ben-Day dots](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/halftone-and-ben-day-dots/) (defining)
- [Painterly brushwork](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/painterly-brushwork/) (occasional)

### Ornament
- [Abundant decoration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/abundant-decoration/) (defining)
- [Floral & vegetal](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/floral-and-vegetal/) (defining)
- [Cosmic & celestial](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/cosmic-and-celestial/) (characteristic)

### Imagery
- [Comic & cartoon](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/comic-and-cartoon/) (defining)
- [Line illustration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/line-illustration/) (defining)
- [Painterly illustration](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/painterly-illustration/) (characteristic)
- [Pattern & repeat](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pattern-and-repeat/) (occasional)

### Medium & production
- [Pen, brush & ink](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/pen-brush-and-ink/) (defining)
- [Offset printing](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/offset-printing/) (characteristic)

### Tone & intent
- [Romantic & sensual](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/romantic-and-sensual/) (defining)
- [Luxurious & glamorous](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/luxurious-and-glamorous/) (characteristic)
- [Warm & approachable](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/warm-and-approachable/) (occasional)
- [Playful & witty](https://stylogeny.com/design-choices/playful-and-witty/) (occasional)

Avoids: Modular grid, Rational & objective, Ornament-free, Fluorescent & neon, Straight photography, Typography only, Non-representational, Agitational & persuasive

Palette: #fbf8f3, #161214, #c4c1c8, #f4b8ca, #c9b8e4, #a8cdea

Typefaces: Free-floating monologue lines (inner monologue set outside the balloons and spread across the page, often in compositions without panel borders, alongside the open layouts (naiho) and decompressed, slower sequences (kaiho) that Natsume Fusanosuke describes; scattered and fragmented in Hagio Moto's The Heart of Thomas, 1974), Words strung across the page (words drifting over the picture, which Honda Masuko describes with the onomatopoeia hirahira, 'fluttering'), Anchi-goshi balloon setting (gothic kanji mixed with bold antique kana, customary in major publishers' children's manga magazines from around 1960, set vertically in the balloons)

Known for: Takahashi Macoto, Arashi o Koete (Beyond the Storm), ballet story in Kōbunsha's Shōjo from January 1958: full-length figures filling the page, superimposed panels and large, sparkling eyes; Maki Miyako, Maki no Kuchibue, Shueisha's Ribon, 1960–1963; Ikeda Riyoko, The Rose of Versailles, Shueisha's weekly Margaret, 21 May 1972 to 23 December 1973; over 23 million copies sold worldwide by 2022; Hagio Moto, The Poe Clan, Bessatsu Shōjo Comic, March 1972 to June 1976; Hagio Moto, The Heart of Thomas, Shūkan Shōjo Comic, 5 May to 22 December 1974: monologue scattered across the page, borderless and overlapping slanted frames, figures surrounded by flower petals; Takemiya Keiko, Kaze to Ki no Uta, Shūkan Shōjo Comic, from 1976; Ōshima Yumiko, Wata no Kunihoshi, Hakusensha's LaLa, from 1978 (3rd Kodansha Manga Award, shōjo category, 1979); Ichijō Yukari, Designer, Ribon, 1974

## Where it comes from, and what it’s close to

- Grew out of: [Story Manga (Postwar Japanese Comics)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/story-manga.md) (1947–present)
- Influenced by: [Taishō Roman & Lyrical Illustration](https://stylogeny.com/styles/taisho-roman.md) (1910–1940)
- Influenced by: [Art Nouveau](https://stylogeny.com/styles/art-nouveau.md) (1890–1910)
- Alike in its design choices: [Métal hurlant Science-Fiction Comics (Mœbius, Druillet & Les Humanoïdes Associés)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/metal-hurlant.md) (1974–1987), 55% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Mir iskusstva Book Art](https://stylogeny.com/styles/mir-iskusstva.md) (1898–1927), 48% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Rinpa & Saga-bon](https://stylogeny.com/styles/rinpa.md) (1600–present), 47% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Modern Calligraphy and Brush Lettering](https://stylogeny.com/styles/modern-calligraphy.md) (2005–present), 45% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Cairo–Beirut Arab Modernist Book & Periodical Design](https://stylogeny.com/styles/cairo-beirut-book-design.md) (1952–1990), 43% alike
- Alike in its design choices: [Persian Popular Narrative (Lithographs & Coffeehouse Painting)](https://stylogeny.com/styles/persian-popular-narrative.md) (1843–2012), 43% alike

## Sources

- Wikipedia: 'Shōjo manga' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sh%C5%8Djo_manga: Kuramochi Kayoko (Kyoto International Manga Museum) and Honda Masuko on 'the imaginative use of flowers, ribbons, fluttering dresses, girls with large sparkling eyes' and 'words that string across the page, which Honda describes using the onomatopoeia hirahira'; Natsume Fusanosuke's naiho (layouts that break from sequential boxes), kaiho (decompression into languid sequences) and mahaku (symbolic white space) from his 1997 book; text 'removed from speech balloons and spread across the page', often in compositions without panel borders; very large, detailed eyes with star-shaped highlights, 'female characters typically having larger eyes than male characters'; The Rose of Versailles 'influential in its depiction of bishōnen', androgynous male characters; the prewar lyrical painters' 'sentimental style influenced by Art Nouveau and Nihonga'; 'Strictly speaking, shōjo manga does not refer to a specific style or a genre but rather indicates a target demographic' and, of its conventions, 'none are strictly exclusive to shōjo manga'; early shōjo manga as 'short, humorous stories with ordinary settings'; the girls' kashihon anthology Kaidan (from 1958) leading other shōjo anthologies to publish horror, and Umezu Kazuo's Reptilia (Shōjo Friend, 1965); the Year 24 Group's non-rigid panel layouts and detailed eyes later spreading to shōnen manga; Takahashi adopting Nakahara's doll-like eyes and adding dots, stars and multiple colours to the iris, then Maki Miyako spreading the style; Arashi o Koete (1958) as the start of the jojōga-influenced style overtaking Tezuka's; Princess Knight (1953–1956) bringing story manga to shōjo magazines; Nakayoshi 1954, Ribon 1955; The Rose of Versailles (1972–1973) as the first major critical and commercial success; otomechikku influencing kawaii)
- Wikipedia: 'Macoto Takahashi' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macoto_Takahashi: born 27 August 1934 in Sumiyoshi-ku, Osaka, died 17 November 2024; kashi-hon illustration from 1953; turned to jojōga after finding Nakahara Jun'ichi's work in Himawari; Arashi o koete 'published in the magazine Shojo' in 1958; 'full-length portraits that fill the entirety of the page', 'the superposition of panels', 'thin bodies and large, sparkling eyes'; later album covers, stationery and covers of shōjo manga magazines)
- Kuramochi Kayoko, 'The Intimate Relationship between "Shōjo" Manga and Fashion', Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry on Google Arts & Culture, supervised by Miyamoto Hirohito of Meiji University (https://artsandculture.google.com/story/dQWBMjmmu_FlIw: 'Arashi wo Koete' by Takahashi Macoto, Shōjo, Kobunsha, 1958; 'the practice of drawing an entire figure freed from the story panels in order to show the details of an entire outfit'; 'layering multiple panels began to develop as a form of expression'; 'ballerinas, frills, and dancing roses'; Nakahara's aesthetics as 'the origin of the uniquely gorgeous style'; Maki no Kuchibue, Ribon, 1960–1963; Ichijō Yukari's Designer, Ribon, 1974; 'Paradise Kiss' by Ai Yazawa 'of "Ribon", who contributed the series to "Zipper"', Zipper, Shodensha, 1999–2003)
- Wikipedia: 'Paradise Kiss' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradise_Kiss: 'a serial in Shodensha's fashion magazine Zipper', 23 March 1999 to 22 March 2003; filed under josei manga)
- Japanese Wikipedia, '少女漫画' (https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/少女漫画: 1958年1月, Arashi o Koete, a ballet story, in Shōjo; the decorative idiom of the late 1950s and early 1960s developing from '抒情画と宝塚歌劇団の影響を受けた…高橋真琴' (Takahashi Macoto, influenced by jojōga and the Takarazuka Revue); eyes with long lashes and many catchlights, flowers drawn behind figures and style drawings (スタイル画); frequent monologue and backgrounds that make inner feeling concrete, such as flowers in full bloom; full-body fashion in title pages and figures breaking out of the panel; The Heart of Thomas (1974) and Kaze to Ki no Uta (1976) in Shūkan Shōjo Comic; Margaret 1963, Shōjo Comic 1968, Hana to Yume 1974; Ribon's furoku switching to goods with shōjo manga art in 1974)
- Wikipedia: 'Year 24 Group' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_24_Group: a retroactive label after Shōwa 24 (1949); narrowest definition Hagio, Ōshima and Takemiya; the Ōizumi Salon, a rented house in Ōizumigakuenchō, Nerima, shared by Hagio and Takemiya from 1971 to 1973; panel borders abstracted or removed; backgrounds, characters and dialogue superimposed into 'non-narrative' layouts focused on emotion; Ikeda removing spatial landmarks; Wata no Kunihoshi's Kodansha Manga Award, which this article dates to 1978 but which was the 3rd award, for 1979, per the two sources that follow; Hi Izuru Tokoro no Tenshi, Kodansha Manga Award 1983; Rachel Thorn, Takeuchi Kayo and Deborah Shamoon among its sources)
- Wikipedia: 'Wata no Kunihoshi' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wata_no_Kunihoshi: 'serialized by Hakusensha in LaLa magazine from 1978 to 1987'; 'In 1979, Wata no Kunihoshi received the 3rd Kodansha Manga Award for the shōjo category')
- Japanese Wikipedia, '講談社漫画賞' (https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/講談社漫画賞: 第3回（1979年度）少女部門『綿の国星』大島弓子（LaLa/白泉社）; 第7回（1983年度）少女部門『日出処の天子』山岸凉子（LaLa/白泉社）)
- Wikipedia: 'The Heart of Thomas' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Heart_of_Thomas: Shūkan Shōjo Comic, 5 May to 22 December 1974; monologues 'fragmented and scattered across the page'; 'comic panels without borders' and 'slanting frames that overlap'; oversized, sparkling eyes; characters surrounded by flower petals; set in a German boys' boarding school, with main characters aged 13 to 15; 'one of the earliest works of shōnen-ai'; Fantagraphics edition translated by Rachel Thorn, 2013)
- Wikipedia: 'The Poe Clan' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Poe_Clan: Bessatsu Shōjo Comic, March 1972 to June 1976) and 'The Rose of Versailles' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rose_of_Versailles: weekly Margaret, 21 May 1972 to 23 December 1973; over 23 million copies sold worldwide by 2022)
- Wikipedia: 'Sailor Moon' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sailor_Moon: Nakayoshi, 28 December 1991 to 3 February 1997; 'the first successful shōjo title in the United States'; Tokyopop's best-selling property in 2001; its influence on Winx Club and W.I.T.C.H.)
- Japanese Wikipedia, 'スクリーントーン' (https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/スクリーントーン: pattern tones printed with small illustrations and motifs, including flowers and sparkling light, used mainly in shōjo manga; the large floral tone no. 244)
- Wikipedia: 'Hana to Yume' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hana_to_Yume: published by Hakusensha from May 1974; LaLa a Hakusensha magazine since 1976)
- Wikipedia: 'Horizontal and vertical writing in East Asian scripts' (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horizontal_and_vertical_writing_in_East_Asian_scripts: most text in manga is written vertically, which dictates the vertical shapes of the speech bubbles)
- Japanese Wikipedia, 'アンチック体' (https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/アンチック体: anchi-goshi mixed setting customary in many works in major publishers' children's manga magazines around 1960, replacing Mincho)
- The National Art Center, Tokyo, 'Shojo Manga Infinity: Moto Hagio, Ryoko Yamagishi, and Waki Yamato', 28 October 2026 to 8 February 2027 (https://www.nact.jp/english/exhibition_special/2026/shojomanga/: the three artists as central figures of the 1970s 'golden age of shojo manga'; title pages including Yamagishi's Hi Izuru Tokoro no Tenshi in LaLa, May 1980)
- The Shoto Museum of Art, 'Junichi Nakahara: Year 111', 29 June to 1 September 2024 (https://shoto-museum.jp/en/exhibitions/204nakahara/: Nakahara Jun'ichi, 1913–1983; illustration, magazine editing and fashion design; Soleil, Himawari and Junior Soleil)
- Mucha Foundation, 'Timeless Mucha: Mucha to Manga, The Magic of Line' (みんなのミュシャ ミュシャからマンガへ――線の魔術), Bunkamura The Museum, Tokyo, 13 July to 29 September 2019 (https://muchafoundation.org/about/news/item/major-upcoming-exhibition-in-tokyo-timeless-mucha-mucha-to-manga-the-magic-of-line: Mucha's linear style and 'how it influenced future generations of artists - particularly in Japanese manga'; https://www.museum.or.jp/event/92473: dates, and a final section on 'ミュシャの耽美的作風に影響を受けながら、1970-80年代に頭角を現す日本のイラストレーターや少女マンガ家たち', Japanese illustrators and shōjo manga artists who rose in the 1970s–80s under the influence of Mucha's aestheticism)

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From Stylogeny (https://stylogeny.com/), an atlas of graphic-design styles by Van Riel Online Services. How it is made: https://stylogeny.com/about/. Cite as: Stylogeny, “Shōjo Manga (Japanese Girls' Comics)”, https://stylogeny.com/styles/shojo-manga/