The kanji 葵 generally represents the "hollyhock" flower, a tall, showy plant with large, colorful blossoms. It can also broadly refer to plants in the mallow family. The core meaning revolves around the plant itself and its visual characteristics.

・On-yomi (音読み): キ (ki) ・Kun-yomi (訓読み): あおい (aoi)

⚫︎ 葵の絵 Translation: Picture of a hollyhock ⚫︎ 葵祭 Translation: Aoi Festival (a traditional festival in Kyoto) ⚫︎ 葵の紋 Translation: Hollyhock crest (a family crest, particularly associated with the Tokugawa shogunate)

The kanji 葵 is a phono-semantic compound (形声文字, けいせいもじ). The left side is a radical called 艸 (草の radical) representing "grass" or "plant." The right side, 癸 (ki), functions as a phonetic component, indicating the sound (though its meaning is unrelated). Therefore, the character was created by combining the meaning component of "plant" with a sound component, implying the "hollyhock" as a plant.