Japanese name meaning 'lily child,' from 'yuri' (lily) and 'ko' (child).
Yuriko is a feminine Japanese name most commonly written 百合子 — the three kanji reading as yuri ("lily") and ko ("child"). The suffix ko, meaning "child," was the dominant ending in Japanese girls' names throughout the twentieth century, lending the name a classic, polished quality. The lily (yuri) holds particular significance in Japanese aesthetics and poetry: white lilies are associated with purity and funerary rites, while the orange tiger lily carries associations with playful independence in classical waka poetry.
The name thus places its bearer within a centuries-long tradition of nature-drawn feminine naming. The name has been carried by a range of distinguished women. Yuriko Miyamoto (1899–1977) was one of Japan's most important leftist novelists, whose unflinching autobiographical fiction explored women's interior lives with uncommon directness in the prewar period.
Yuriko Koike, who became Tokyo's first female governor in 2016 and was later re-elected, brought the name into the center of contemporary Japanese political life. The ballet dancer Yuriko Kikuchi, known simply as Yuriko, became a celebrated figure in American modern dance, performing with Martha Graham for decades and carrying the name into Western artistic consciousness. In post-bubble Japan, the ko ending fell somewhat out of fashion as parents shifted toward shorter or more unusual names, making Yuriko feel gently nostalgic — elegant and composed, associated with a certain mid-century feminine ideal. Outside Japan, the name travels remarkably well: its clear three-syllable structure (Yu-ri-ko) is accessible to non-Japanese speakers, and its lily meaning resonates in Western naming traditions that have always valued flower names for girls.