Now that the holidays are over, I had to start thinking of what new printables I should work on for Vintage Fangirl. Chinese New Year is right around the corner, so I decided to pull a new illustration from my Flower Children book by Elizabeth Gordon. So here is the China Aster – a lovely lavender fellow:

China Aster Flower Children Illustration by Elizabeth Gordon - Click for larger printable version

According to the poem that accompanies this illustration, the China Aster thought the proper thing to do was “wear a queue.” I honestly had no idea what wearing a queue meant, so I looked it up. Turns out this is the name for the traditional long Chinese ponytail worn by men from the 17th century up until the 1920’s. It was actually compulsory for men to wear their hair this way; not to do so was considered treason. (Whoa.) But in the early 1910s, it was no longer mandatory – and the Flower Children book first came out in 1910. So I’m guessing this little rhyme was a nod to the fact that wearing a queue was on it’s way out of style.

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