If you’ve ever purchased beef in Japan this package will look very familiar. Everything from the brown butcher paper meant to look like thin strips of wood, to the red and white slabs of beef ready to be laid down on a hot grill. And while this product won’t satisfy your salivary glands, they will satisfy your sweat glands. The Niku Towel (literally, meat towel) is a towel meant to resemble a large slice of beef. It can be taken to the beach, worn around your neck or simply hung in the bathroom.
It all started, apparently, when designer Seiko Makita thought, “If a person walking towards me had meat rapped [sic] around his/her neck, that will be funny.” But there’s nothing funny about the quality that went in to making the playful item. The designers went straight to Imabari, the “Towel Capital” of Japan where they found a manufacturer to bring their idea to life using traditional Japanese thread interweaving methods. It’s available through Mitsubai Tokyo, Amazon Japan or directly from the designer’s shop.
