Paper Cranes is a collective of mostly manga-based sites run by Kotono. The collective debuted in late 2001 under its original name Origami Wings housing a simple shrine to Sailorjupiter and an even simpler tribute to Kaitou Ace. The collection has since grown to accommodate the webmistress's ever-changing rollercoaster of fangirlisms. The name Paper Cranes was adopted somewhere in the site's history because it seemed more poetic and grown-up. The collective was lost in 2005 and relaunched in 2007 with the subtitle The Silk Dawn Network (or The Shoujo Love Network depending on how Kotono feels).
Webmistress
Kotono is a twenty-something-year-old with a love for literature, music, photography, and manga. She attends college and is close to finishing degrees in both professional writing and music.
She began shrine-making in late 1999 and hasn't stopped since. She began with a small shrine to Sailorjupiter, which contained only a profile and image gallery. This grew to encompass more and more fandoms, but always with a shoujo-edge.
More the webmistress will come soon, but for now you can contact her at jovianprincess@yahoo.com (make sure to use a snazzy title), or via the the update log. She loves to make new friends!
Aesthetics
There was no one point of inspiration for this layout. I kind of happened to stumble up the image and the song at around the same time, and they just fit. It's been ages since I read Shoujo Kakumei Utena, and I wasn't planning on using Utena and Touga for a layout, but something in the image said "That's it." I don't know. I like it all right.
The layout itself was created in Adobe Photoshop and coded with Notepad. It uses patterns and textures from Aethereality and Hybrid Genesis. It took approximately eight hours to make and code.
"The Night Starts Here" by Stars
The night starts here, the night starts here.
Forget your name, forget your fear.
The night starts here, the night starts here.
Forget your name, forget your fear.
The pleasure part, the afterthought, the missing stone in the graveyard;
the time we have, the task at hand, the love it takes to become a man;
the dust at dawn is rained upon, attaches itself to everyone.
No one is spared, no one is clean.
It travels places you've never been or seen before.
The night starts here, the night starts here.
Forget your name, forget your fear.
The night starts here, the night starts here.
Forget your name, forget your fear.
You drop a coin into the sea
and shout out "Please come back to me."
You name your child after your fear
and tell them "I have brought you here."
The pleasure part, the aftershock, the moment that it takes to fall apart;
the time we have, the task at hand, the love it takes to destroy a man;
the ecstasy, the being free, that big black cloud over you and me;
and after that, the upward fall, and were we angels after all?
I don't know; I don't know.